Читать книгу Faking It / Forbidden Sins - Stefanie London - Страница 19

Owen

I LEAVE THE gallery with Hannah close to 11:00 p.m. We stay longer than most, chatting to Rowan and Dom. Rowan told us in hushed tones that Matt and Celina had a tumultuous relationship—on again and off again. Their strange work hours and the pressures of their perfectionist tendencies had put them under a lot of strain. Before we left, Hannah got a card from Celina and promised to call for a private appointment.

Now, Hannah and I stroll along the Southbank Boulevard. I’d suggested a cab, but she wanted to walk. Processing time, she called it. I’d rather be back at 21 Love Street and straight into a cold shower, because her dress is turning my resolve to mush and her gently smudged lipstick has me thinking about what I could do to further ruin her makeup.

Sparkling lights bounce off the Yarra River as we walk, and the night air is filled with the sound of music and laughter. This part of the city is full of bars and restaurants and, despite the chill in the air, people are out in force.

“Do you think much about the academy days?” she asks me, out of nowhere.

“Sure. They’re fond memories.” I’d made a lot of friends back then—though many dissolved after I left. It’s something I’ve learned over the years—when you hang out with ghosts for too long you can easily become one.

She steps up to the railing overlooking the river. “Was it hard to walk away?”

“No.” Self-preservation is the easy route.

“Not even a little bit?”

“Are you mistaking me for someone with a heart?” I aim for a joking tone and miss by a longshot. “I left my grandmother two months after my granddad passed. I was her only other family…and I left. Like a coward.”

Shit. Why did I say that?

The sincerity shines out of Hannah’s eyes like she’s turned into a fucking Care Bear. I don’t want her to look at me like that. I’m not a person to be saved. Hell, I’m not a person to be loved. I operate best in the middle ground between friend and acquaintance.

“Why did you go? I’m not buying the whole ‘I’m chasing a whim’ thing.”

“You don’t need to buy it because I’m not selling it.”

Nobody from my police force days is aware of my past, except for the people who run the psych evaluations and the superiors who looked over my file before I entered the academy. I haven’t told a single person unless it was absolutely, one-hundred-percent necessary. Not even Max knows, and he’s the closest friend I’ve ever had.

“You were missed,” she says quietly, almost as if reflecting to herself. “By a lot of people.”

“By you? I thought you hated my guts.”

“I did…for a bit.” She leans against the railing and tilts her head up at me—all lashes and big brown eyes and a sweet expression that’s softer than anything I’ve seen from her before. “It’s hard not to hate the guy who made you a laughing stock.”

“You were hardly a laughing stock.”

“Really?” She pushes back up to a standing position and folds her arms. “Let me see if I remember this correctly. You snuck into my room, found my diary and decided to do a dramatic reading to a bunch of my peers.”

“Firstly, I didn’t sneak into your room. I was visiting Vanessa and she opened the door. Secondly, it wasn’t like I had to scavenge for the damn thing. It was right there on your nightstand…in a box. Under a picture frame.”

Okay, fine. It had been hidden and I’d hunted it out.

Hannah rolls her eyes. “And how do you explain busting open the lock, huh? Did it fall off when you picked it up because your hands are so strong no metal can withstand your grip?”

I laugh and the feeling drives all the way through me, loosening my muscles. Thawing the ice cage around my heart. She always had that effect on me. It’s hard not to like a girl who can make you laugh from down deep.

“I may have encouraged it to open,” I reply. “With a paperclip.”

“You picked the lock on my diary like a ten-year-old boy!” She’s blushing again and I know we’re thinking about the same thing.

Hannah Anderson, who’d always seemed like this straitlaced, buttoned-up good girl, had been harbouring some dark and dirty thoughts…about me. At the time, I did not expect to see my name on those pages. She’d always acted like I was a bug to be swatted. Or some gum stuck to the bottom of her shoe.

When I decided—in my young, stupid brain—that it would be a good idea to read her diary, I had not planned to make it a show. But my roommate had caught me, demanded to know who it belonged to and rounded up a bunch of guys to listen in. I never divulged Hannah’s name. Ever.

But someone obviously figured it out.

“Do you remember what it said?” she asks. She’s luminous under the moonlight and street lamps, her dress glimmering through the gap between her coat lapels. That peek of bare skin is everything and nothing—the best kind of tease.

I want him. Even though I don’t truly know what wanting is because I’ve never slept with anyone before. But I want to send everyone away for one night—just one—so I can lose everything I have to him. I want to know what it’s like to be fucked. Will it hurt? Will he lie with me afterward? I have no idea if I’m even on his radar. Owen could have any girl here, but I want him to have me. Hard.

The words were forever imprinted on my brain. They’d circled like vultures, preying on my sanity and concentration. The night she’d come to me after we graduated, with sooty eyes like blackened pits, my fucked-up brain hadn’t been able to shut out the darkness. The second I started to feel anything about Hannah, all I could think about was the dead girl I’d loved more than anything else.

“You do remember,” she says. “You just weren’t interested.”

“Believe me, it wasn’t like that. I only took the damn diary because I wanted to know more about you and being a dumb kid, I didn’t think I could ask.” He shook his head. “I never meant for anyone else to see the pages.”

“Water under the bridge now,” she said with a shrug. “It’s not like it stopped me doing anything I wanted to do…well, not most things anyway.”

I don’t respond to the innuendo hanging in the air. We shouldn’t be talking like this—not when we’ve got shit to do and a case to close and not when I’m leaving the second it’s all over. “Nothing will ever stop you, Anderson. You’re a force.”

“Why do you say sweet things like that when I’d rather you say something dirty?”

My head snaps toward her. “Don’t tempt me.”

“Why?”

“Because I can’t go there. Not with you.”

Her face falls and I want to explain. I want to tell her that it’s nothing to do with her and everything to do with me. I want to tell her that it’s because I’m not capable of treating her the way she deserves to be treated. That I can take her to bed, but that will be it, and I don’t know if I can handle the look on her face when I leave after it’s all done.

“It’s…” Fuck. I’m so not good at this. I can walk away from my troubles like a boss, but staying and talking…I suck at it. “You’re hot, okay? It’s nothing to do with that.”

She tilts her head in a way that reminds me of an adorable puppy. “So it’s not because there’s a lack of physical chemistry.”

I laugh. “Hell no. That’s not it at all.”

We’re still standing at the river, and a group of drunk girls totter past giggling and singing. On the water, there’s a cruise boat stuffed full of partygoers. Music floats toward us and so does the sound of laughter and cheering. They’re all so obliviously happy.

“I’m not asking for a ring, Owen.” She nudges me with her elbow. “I already got that.”

“What are you asking for?” I go against my better judgement with that question, but the air is burning up around us and we’re standing close enough that I could capture her lips with mine.

“One night.” Her chest rises and falls with a big breath. “Get it out of our systems. I’d like very much to be able to concentrate on the job and I just…can’t. Not with the tension distracting me.”

One night, no strings, with the girl I’ve crushed on ever since she walked into the first-day induction session at the Victoria Police Academy. It would be so easy to say yes.

“No.” The word comes out a lot weaker than I’d hoped.

“Why?”

“Because the whole one-night thing doesn’t work when you know the person. It’s all fine to say we’ll act like it never happened, but we both know that’s bullshit.”

“What if I wasn’t me?” There’s a darkness to her expression, a simmering heat that pulls me in. “What if I was someone else?”

“What?”

“I’m already playing a role. Hannah Essex.” She wriggles her fingers and my mother’s ring glints in the light. “I can simply change roles and be someone else.”

She wants it that badly? My fingers twitch and my cock is aching for release—I’ve been in a semi-state of excitement for days and this is only making it worse. How long before I break? How long before my willpower is a billion glittering shards?

“Surely you’re not intimidated by a bit of role play?” Her tongue darts out to moisten her lips and I’m about ready to fall to my knees in front of her.

“I’m not afraid of role play.” I grit the words out.

“Then I’m going to be in that bar, ordering a drink.” She turns and points to a little hole-in-the-wall place with the ambient glow of low-hanging lights. “If you come find me, we’ll pretend to be other people for the night.”

Bloody hell. “And if I don’t come find you?”

“Then I have my answer.”

She turns and walks across the tree-lined boulevard, pausing at the edge of the bar to shrug out of her coat. Her dress glimmers, like stars winking at me, beckoning me closer. I catch the flash of her toned, bare legs and those shiny silver shoes before she disappears inside.