Wildfire

Chapter 4

4. Touch

Exhaustion crashed through me like a tidal wave and I slumped back against the sink, my head hitting the wall with a muted thump. My teeth were starting to chatter fiercely and I had to squeeze my bloody hands together between my thighs to hold them still. It felt like the worst sugar crash on the planet, made ever worse by the dull throbbing in my head that threatened to escalate into a full-blown headache.

I'm clearly studying the wrong major, I thought as my eyes swept around the bathroom. The cold, white tiles were splattered with blood and my hoodie looked like someone had been stabbed to death in it. It was slung haphazardly across the lid of the toilet, and blood dripped slowly from the dangling sleeve.

How could someone lose so much blood and live?

My eyes flickered toward the half-naked man sprawled across the bathroom floor. Already, the colour was starting to return to his skin. No longer ashen, the bronze tones of his skin were much more pronounced, and he had the sort of tan that Charlie would have sold her soul to possess. His muscled chest rose and fell periodically, and if I listened carefully, I could hear the soft swish of his breath as he exhaled. His hands were curled into tight fists at his sides, and as I watched, they clenched suddenly and then relaxed a little.

The pain, I realized. Other than the mouthful of vodka he'd had at the beginning of the... procedure... he hadn't had any sort of pain medication. How had he managed to stay conscious for so long? Nobody was that resilient, and he hadn't even screamed when I had pulled the bullet out.

My eyes wandered over his chest to the strong line of his jaw.

A squirmy sensation erupted in my stomach as I studied his face, like excitement and indigestion twisted into one tightly coiled mess. Like I was standing on the precipice of a cliff with no choice but to fall. God, he was gorgeous – even my cautious, only-date-good-boys mind could see that. He was frowning gently in his sleep, shallow lines etched into his forehead, and even without those dark, chocolate-coloured eyes boring into my skull, there was still something edgy about him. Something that stopped me from reaching out, even when my fingers tingled with the urge to smooth away his frown.

He was everything that I'd strived to avoid my entire life, but for once, my instincts had shut the hell up. Or, at least, they were more than a little confused about what they should be screaming at me. It wasn't like they were used to guiding me through life-or-death situations like this – and besides, how dangerous could an unconscious body be, anyway?

A muted, beeping noise echoed through the tiny bathroom and I jumped, banging my head against the underside of the sink.

Ow, I winced. It took me a few seconds to realize that the beeping noise was coming from his jeans – or, more precisely, the front pocket of his jeans, where he'd stowed my cell phone earlier. I scrambled forward and pulled it out of his jeans as quickly as I could, my eyes fixed resolutely on the glass door of the shower.

The screen flashed, Incoming Call: Charlie.

Sighing, I rose to my feet and hit the answer button.

"I don't think I'm going to be home tonight," I said hastily. I wandered out into the bedroom, lowering my voice on the off chance that Diego woke up from the coma he was in. "Sorry for not calling you sooner."

My bag was still strewn across the bed where I'd left it, the contents of my make-up bag spilling out over the duvet. I collected them up as swiftly as I could, my cheeks warming as I shoved the box of condoms as far down into the bag as physically possible.

"Oh, really?" Charlie tried to sound casual, but she failed – dismally. The tremor of excitement in her voice made me wince; I hated lying to her, even if it was by omission.