her mouth parted and she fell apart, trembling through her pleasure.
He pumped his dick, knowing he ought not to come inside her, and he didn’t have to pump long before plunging back inside her heat just before he came.
He didn’t care.
He should have cared.
But he wanted his seed inside her.
She lay on his chest, spent and sore, face flushed, body slick with sweat. She’d placed his hand on his chest beside her head and traced her finger along his open palm.
“They say these lines tell your future,” she murmured, tracing over the thick lines along his palm.
Thames stared at the ceiling, in a peaceful lull between sleep and consciousness.
“What do mine say, dove?” he asked, quietly.
“I don’t know,” she replied tiredly. “We can get palm readings, if you believe that sort of thing.”
“Would you want to know, if you could?” he wondered more to himself.
“Hmm.” She hummed lightly, thinking. “Isn’t that part of life, though, to be swept up with its surprises along the way?”
“What if something bad happened?” he questioned, feeling his heart beat faster. “What if avoiding one little game could have stopped something very bad from happening?”
She didn’t respond for some time, lost in thought. Then she muttered, “We are the sum of all our experiences. Good and bad, we learn from our mistakes. So how are we supposed to become who we are without the bad experiences, too?”
To that, Thames said nothing.
He let out a sigh and pulled her close. If he didn’t hold her tight enough, she might disappear.
He might wake up in his cell, and this all would have been a dream.
THE HOLE
“25, 26, 27…”
Max shook his head to clear it as Conor continued counting to 100.
The figure Max thought he saw was gone now, and he was convinced it was all in his head. He glanced around, just to be sure. It was easy to see things in the bush – it was easy to see things in the dark in his room at night, too – and it made him a little uneasy.
Jem’s words echoed in his head…
You’re a baby, Max.
Scared of everything.
The Great Whiner.
He blinked the tears away and steeled himself, feeling determined to prove them all wrong. He trudged further into the bush, until Conor’s voice was slightly muffled.
As he spun around, frantic, trying to decide what tree to hide behind, something poked out of the ground, catching his attention.
He stepped closer to it, making out what appeared to be a storm shelter. He’d seen these shelters in the movies; it was a place to hide out in just before a tornado swept through the land. Those movies always frightened him.
Its steel doors were spread apart like open arms, inviting him in. He paused right over it, peering down into the darkness.
Goosebumps trailed his arms, but as he looked up and around him, he felt alone as ever. It was just him, in the bush, leaves swaying over him, and in the distance was Conor’s voice, counting.
“37, 38, 39…”
He didn’t have long.
They’d never suspect him to have the courage to be this far out. They’d never in their wildest dreams think he’d have the guts to wade into a storm shelter in the middle of the bush on this abandoned land.
If he did this – if he hid well – they might respect him. They might not think of him as a baby –
As the Great Whiner.
Max sucked in a sharp breath, hating how much those words stung.
With determined courage he’d never felt before, he stepped into the hole.
Chapter Fourteen
Charlotte
The week flew by without incident.
I was tempted to keep Penny at home for a few more days so she could spend more time with Conor, but he told me it was important she continue living her routine. I suspected maybe he needed alone time to adjust to his freedom, and he hadn’t gotten much of it with us around as often as we were. It couldn’t have been easy to feel enormous emotion after so long feeling nothing. The past two days he’d been more reserved than usual, locked inside his mind with faraway eyes.
We got up early and ate pancakes for breakfast, and I was guzzling my coffee fiercely. I couldn’t believe Conor refused to drink any as he looked like he needed it more than me. He’d been up before me. I found him in the bathroom, standing in front of the sink, his hands clenching the counter. I noticed how white his knuckles looked, but I didn’t