The Moth and the Flame (When Rivals Play #2) - B.B. Reid Page 0,135

milk?”

I pictured him frowning but was too chicken to confirm. “That you cared.” I took a sip of the milk and let out an appreciative hum when I realized he’d added sugar.

“You think I’m a jerk?”

“Is that a serious question?” I shot back before taking another sip.

“Yes.”

I started, not expecting his answer. Forcing down the milk, I looked into his eyes. “If it bothers you, why do you act this way?”

“Like what?”

“Like the world wronged you.”

He shrugged and ran his hand through his already unkempt hair. I loved how the light made his hair look more red than brown.

“Maybe it has.”

“That would imply that it owed you something in the first place.”

“So you’re not angry?” he countered.

“About what?”

“You’ve been here for few days, and no one has come beating down the door looking for you.” I heard the hidden question in his statement.

“Maybe I just hide really well.”

“Or maybe they never bothered to look.”

I pushed air through my lips but said nothing. The Hendersons would be busy preparing for their new life in Austin. Of course, my social worker would be looking for me, but that was her job, and with a caseload her size, a seventeen-year-old who was mere months from aging out of the system would be the least of her priorities.

“What about your family?” he pressed.

“What about them?”

“Wren told us about your parents.”

I snorted. “Yeah, well, Wren talks too much.”

“If it helps, he was wasted when he told us. Why hasn’t the rest of your family claimed you?”

“Because I was never theirs to claim.”

He frowned at that. “What do you mean?”

“Brian and Emily,” I said, speaking their names for the first time in five years, “weren’t my birth parents. They adopted me when I was a baby. I guess that’s why it was so easy for them to leave me behind for greener pastures.” I wasn’t of their flesh and blood, so when they left, it hadn’t felt like a piece of them was missing. I only wished I could say the same.

“Fuck, Lou,” was all Jamie said. I could feel his horror creeping under my skin and cooling my blood.

“My mother, whoever she was, gave me up so I could be left behind by strangers again and again and again.”

“Maybe she thought she was doing what was best for you.”

I chuckled at the idea of Jamie being a romantic. I bet if he were wearing clothes right now, I’d find his heart on his sleeve. Instead, he’d chosen to let something else hang free.

Keep your eyes up, Lou. Don’t even think about it.

“The only thing good intentions prove is that no one knows what’s best for you other than yourself,” I spat.

“If that were true, instead of mating, we’d be sprouting from the ground like plants with no need for the bonds we hold close to our hearts. You like to think you’re a wolf without a pack, Lou, but you’re not completely alone. If you were, you’d be dead already—inside or six feet under.”

I sneered at him. “And how do you know that?”

“Because we’re not that different,” he muttered. And then with a sigh, as if all were truly lost, he added, “That’s why I can’t fuck you.”

I didn’t even try to keep my eyes from rolling. “Right…that’s why.”

He gave me a knowing look. “Don’t try to convince me that it never crossed your mind.”

“It hasn’t,” I lied bitingly.

I suddenly felt him hovering behind me, his breath warming my nape. “Not even to make him jealous?”

“Who?” I asked, playing coy. He only sucked his teeth in response. “I don’t know what you mean,” I insisted.

“Like I said,” he whispered while slipping his hand under my T-shirt, “I won’t fuck you, but I can be of service.” He let the offer hang in the air as he ran the back of his fingers across my belly, heating every inch of skin on the way. “You won’t be the first girl I’ve helped out of the friend zone.”

I forced a laugh as my mind raced. “So that would make you, what? Some kind of relationship gigolo?”

“A gigolo with a ninety-nine percent success rate,” he bragged.

“What happened to the other one percent?”

“She fell for me instead.” He leaned down and pressed his lips against my forehead, but that wasn’t all I felt pressed against me. Resting against my hip was the hard and rather long evidence that he’d make some lucky girl very happy one day. I just hoped she had the patience and fortitude to put it