PERIPHERY | NH |

FOURTEEN

Niall

39.. 40.. 41.. 42.. 43.. 44.. 45..

I watch as the speedometer climbs the more my foot presses against the pedal, ready to fly right past the fucking asshole of a cop that camps out next to the donut shop.

His patrol car is in my line of sight as I fly past him, seeing him through the windshield not even flinching — letting me go right past him.

What the fuck?

How is Hunter going to get pulled over for going three miles an hour under the speed limit and I can speed race my way past ten miles an hour over and he doesn't even flinch?

Make that make sense to me.

It hasn't sat well with me for awhile but again, I don't want to overstep my bounds as her boss.

Fucking boss.

Stupid.

Pulling into the parking lot I'm even more frustrated knowing that I'm late, something that I haven't been in months. Ever since I realized how much extra time I could get with Hunter by being early, my ass has been on time every goddamn day.

Except today my alarm didn't go off because I forgot to set it after running a shit ton of errands and going over to Parker's house to watch a couple of games, getting home later than I should have.

My conversations with Hunter stayed the same, almost like she wanted to pretend that nothing happened, or almost happened when we were alone with nothing but a soft glow from the candles in my kitchen.

That next morning I woke up early and checked to see her still asleep down the hall, smiling at the contrast her auburn hair created against the white sheets in the king sized bed.

Figuring there was enough time, I grabbed my keys and headed down to the diner a few miles away from my house and ordered half of the menu to go because I didn't know what Hunter liked, excited that even if it was only for another hour that I would have her with me. Only when I pulled back into my drive her car was gone.

Her leaving was for the best and I knew it. After that night, I knew that neither one of us were going to be able to deny anything between us anymore.

There's no way to describe how it felt when I slipped my hands under her sweater, the way her sweet skin felt against my own. Or the way we both looked at each other as longing settled into the air around us, the thick tension something we couldn't avoid as we whispered about wanting each other even though we knew that's the exact thing we couldn't have.

I felt like I didn't have a choice when I begged her to sleep at my place, knowing I'd rather sleep down the hall from her than know she wasn't near me at all.

I needed to talk to her.

I need to make sure she's not mad at me, that I didn't do something wrong.

Trying to push my thoughts and frustrations to the back of my mind, my hands grip the bag in the backseat before pulling it over the console only for the zipper to fall apart, watching as all the contents spill all over the floorboard.

"Are you fucking joking me?" Mumbling under my breath, I get out of the car so that I can stuff the highlighters and pens, notebooks, and cables back into the black bag and walk inside knowing at this point I'm like thirty minutes late my entire mood has gone to shit and to be honest I don't even want to be here.

Even if the person that belongs to my daydreams is in that fucking room.

"About time you show up." Zeke laughs along with a couple of the others as I just let my bag drop to the floor, glaring at him. "Fuck, haven't seen you show up this late in months."