Five Hundred Miles

1.4: Don't.

Chapter 1.4: Don't.

[“I crush her against me. I want to be part of her. Not just inside her but all around her. I want our rib cages to crack open and our hearts to migrate and merge. I want our cells to braid together like living thread.”  ---Warm Bodies]

The one in the picture is Derek.

Derek is in the study alone, typing rapidly on the keyboard as his forehead creases in concentration. He doesn't even realize that I came in, but I want to talk to him. Is he feeling okay? He and Gideon are not talking when they see each other.

I knock to get his attention. His head snaps up, and his eyes soften once he sees me. His lips form a tight line and he smiles tightly.

“Am I interrupting?" I ask cautiously.

“No, it's fine." He pushes his chair out of the desk and closes the laptop. “I'm about to take a break. Do you wanna talk for a while?"

“Only when you promise not to be mad or angry."

He quirks his brow in amusement.

“What?" I quirk mine. “That's part of the agreement now."

He chuckles softly and makes a polite gesture for me to follow him. We move outside the balcony as he slides the door close. I breathe in the night time air, feeling my legs float.

“How's your day with him?" He asks, sounding husky. For a second I thought that it isn't Derek.

“A little bit boring. I fell asleep a couple of times while he's on the phone. We ate dinner with his secretary, Kelly." I tell him.

“Ah, the hot Asian woman," Derek remarks, nodding. I have to smile at that. “My day was bad."

I look at him. He stays silent until I get to my point. “Tell me about your sister."

It isn't a request. We both know it.

“Her name is Cara, and she's five years younger than me, which makes her five years younger than Gideon too, since he's at my age. She used to get cornered by big boys, those bastards, and they made their moves on her. I hadn't found out until years later, when I heard her crying in her bed. I kind of asked her about it and she spilled it out. That was when I started doing my job as a big brother, only after these horrible things." He kinds of cringes when he says those words, as if they are poison.

I rest my hand on his shoulder, comforting him.

“I almost killed the boys. They actually had the guts to smirk at me after what they did to Cara. I couldn't—they deserved worse." His eyes soften, and at that moment he looks vulnerable. “Now do you get why I'm that protective of my sister? I just can't simply let a kinky sex-starved bastard wreck her again, she had had enough shit to deal with. And now my best friend might had sex with her. Don't tell me to deal with it."

“Gideon isn't a kinky bastard," I say without realizing.

“Oh, you wouldn't know. He's moving on fast, he's always moving on." There's a hint of iciness in his voice, one that makes me want to scoot away from him. “Remember what I told you, Faith. He's dangerous, complicated. Be careful, don't do him."

I squeeze his shoulder. “How nicely spoken of you, even if he's your best friend."

“That's not the point, Faith. Look at me," He spins me around so that he stares into my eyes with his green ones. I can make out every inch of his face lines even under the dim light. Only that his eyes are filled with intensity. “I just want you to be careful, that is all."