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CHAPTER THIRTEEN 
BENTLEY
I really would’ve gotten more sleep going home, but the way River was looking at me just pulled me back in. How am I supposed to become unattached if I’m letting myself get more attached?
He was restless throughout the night and left at some point to get something in the kitchen. Even now, he’s sleeping fitfully. The cat crawls over to him and lays her body over his head before curling up. Then she watches me with vibrant green eyes that seem to be all-knowing. I’ve never felt as judged as I do at this moment.
I try to be quiet as I get out of bed, but he immediately notices it and wakes up.
“Morning,” he mumbles.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” I say.
“You didn’t. The cat becoming one with my face did. Sometimes she tries to wrap her whole body around me, and I’m not sure if it’s love or she’s trying to make it hard for me to breathe. She might be trying to kill me,” he says.
To me it looks like she’s trying to protect him. They say cats can detect illnesses in people. Can she sense his?
He pulls her down as she digs her claws into his face and yowls before biting his nose.
Or maybe he’s right and she’s trying to kill him.
“Ow! Dammit, Banshee! Let me get up!”
At least I notice she doesn’t draw blood on him like she does to me. He grabs her and pins her down before kissing her face. She gives him a look of disgust but doesn’t even try to get away.
“There are so many nice animals out there,” he says. “And this is the one I end up with.”
“She loves you,” I say with a smile as he sits up.
“She loves the idea of me feeding her and her chewing on my face,” he says, but he lights up every time he holds her, so I’m not sure who he’s trying to fool.
“I have spare clothes in my car I’m going to grab,” I say.
“Okay. I would make you breakfast, but I don’t actually have anything for you to eat. I could like… make some waffles and then bleed all over them. Does that sound appetizing?”
“Delicious, honestly,” I joke. “I don’t even know what waffles taste like.”
He gasps dramatically. “Oh my god, you don’t? They taste like little bites of heaven.”
“What’s ice cream taste like?” I ask.
“Cold bites of heaven.”
“What’s heaven taste like?”
“Ice cream, obviously,” he says before stretching and pushing himself up. I don’t miss the way he sets his hand on the table to steady himself, and I can’t help but wonder if there were other signs I’ve missed since I met him.
“What are the symptoms?” I ask.
He looks over at me before I realize that maybe he doesn’t want to talk about it. Maybe he likes to pretend it doesn’t exist and that’s fine too.
I hold my hand up. “Sorry, you don’t have to talk about it.”
“It’s not too bad. Headaches, dizziness, rarely nausea and vomiting. The headaches are the worst. But I’m fine, I promise. It could be worse—the doctors told me I could start having seizures as the tumor presses on my brain.”
I nod, finding myself at a loss for words as I head for the door to get my clothes. By the time I return he’s feeding Banshee her food, which seems to please the demon greatly.
After changing, I come in and see that he’s printing something. When I walk in, he holds the paper out to me with a gloved hand. “Here’s the list of names from what I can remember,” he says. “The ones at the top here, above the line, I’m positive on. The ones below the line are names the vampire who bought me mentioned at some point.”
“And he went by Corbyn?” I ask.
“Yes.”
I’d looked it up but found nothing remarkable. There were countless Corbyns and the likelihood that it was his documented name was probably next to none, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t worth looking into.
I take the paper and glance down at the list of names:
Trent Wilder
George White
Bo Huang
__________
Dr. Vick Dansby
David Carlston
Tabitha Herald
I don’t recognize all of the names, but I’ll look into them as soon as I get to work. “Please promise me you’ll stay here and just let me handle it?”
He nods. “For now. But if I see no progress being made, I’m going to finish it. I have to. I don’t have much time left to keep people from suffering like me. I really want to end this.”
“Okay, I understand,” I say, positive that with my team at the VRC we’ll be able to unwind this.
He grabs my wrist as I turn to the door, so I look back at him. “Bentley, I don’t know how deep this goes. I don’t know how many people in law enforcement are a part of this. I don’t want them to target you because of me, so please… I’m begging you, please be safe and don’t risk anything. He made it sound like there was so much control from the police that no one would ever be able to take them down. That he knew he was safe and so was everyone else because they were protected.” River sighs. “I don’t know. I guess I’m just anxious that you’re going to get hurt because of me, and that’s the last thing I want to happen.”
“I’ll be careful,” I assure him.
“Just because you’re a vampire doesn’t make you invincible. Please remember that.”
I nod because I understand, but sometimes I get caught up in the idea that I don’t care. I don’t believe I’m invincible like Marcus, but occasionally, I let the weight of shit in my life weigh me down enough that I take added risks. Why keep living when everyone around me is constantly dying?
“Please,” River says.
I give him a smile and a nod. “I will. I promise.”
Then I turn to the door and head for work as a whirlwind of questions weigh me down. What should I do? What’s right? What’s wrong?
When I reach work, I’ve answered no more questions than before. But as I walk in and see Wren standing there, I slow down.
“What. The. Fuck,” Marcus growls from behind me, and everyone in the office turns to look our way. I sidestep him so A) I don’t get trampled in his journey to make Wren suffer and B) it doesn’t look like I’m with Marcus.
“Oh boy,” Finn says as he steps up beside me. “Do you think he’ll make Wren fly again? Did I ever tell you how much I loved that?” He’s referring to our last large case that Wren had been called in on. He’d immediately hated Finn because he was a human in the VRC, and even threatened him until Marcus pinned him against the wall and shouted at him.
“You don’t need to,” I say. “You’ve talked about it enough that I’m positive everyone knows.”
“‘He is mine!’” Finn echoes blissfully. He’s so strange but in a good way. I think it’s that smile that just makes every ridiculous thing out of his mouth seem normal.
“You’re so weird, moj zanuda,” Alexei says as he walks in. Then he sees Wren and literally growls before rushing up to help Marcus, like the two of them will behead Wren together. Sometimes I wonder how we keep from getting kicked out of law enforcement. Our entire group is filled with people who are rarely law-abiding or normal.
“Well, this is going to be fun,” Finn says as he walks into the room and I follow after him.
“What are you doing here?” Marcus growls.
“I’ve been assigned to take over your case because you were doing an inadequate job at it,” Wren says defiantly.
“That wasn’t why,” Brooks says as he walks over to us. “We got word from higher up that with all of these important vampires getting threatened, they’re insisting on a team that specializes in similar cases to take over, so we’re to brief them today.”
“We have to work with them?” Marcus asks, sounding horribly disgusted.
Brooks looks hesitant as he shakes his head. “No, it’ll become their case, and we’ll be moved on to a case that’s district level.”
“We’ve been pulled off the case and for what?” Finn asks, clearly irritated. “We’ve gotten plenty of information on it. We’ve been doing our job well and making progress.”
“After the incident with DeGray, they think it’d be best for a specialized team,” Brooks says, not looking at all thrilled about this either.
“You act like we haven’t been hurt or had issues on the job before,” Marcus says. “Who ordered this?”
Brooks sighs. “Come on, Marcus, let’s go talk with Wren and see what we can settle. There’s nothing we can do about this to make it any different.”
The three of them head to the office where it wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if Marcus popped Wren’s head off while he was in there. At least it won’t take much detective work to find the culprit.
“Is this my fault?” I ask.
Finn shakes his head. “No, it’s not your fault. I think someone’s getting anxious and wants a more specialized team on it. Maybe they’re wondering if they’re next?”
“They’re going to be next when I get done with them,” Alexei growls as he storms over to his computer and starts answering emails. I’d hate to be the victims that get those emails. After fifteen minutes, Marcus returns and walks over to us.
He throws up his hands and sighs. “I tried. The case is theirs. There’s nothing we can do about it and everything is now out of our hands and into theirs. We’re supposed to spend the morning sharing our wealth of information with them,” he growls. It’s going to be a long morning.
I join the team as we meet with Wren’s team. He has a new person who seems to be taking the place of Smith named Foster, who is a nice lady who kind of takes over whenever Wren gets snippy. She’s clearly much more in charge than Smith was. He also has a man named Grant who just watches quietly while jotting everything we say down. When we’re done sharing with them, Wren has me join Foster and Grant in a “private discussion” where I’m supposed to share anything and everything from the previous night, like I hadn’t already shared it ten times.
“It’s all in the reports, and I told you everything back there,” I say, referring to the meeting we’d had as a group.
“We just want to make sure we didn’t miss anything,” Foster says with a smile.
Grant flips through some papers and refences his notebook since he still believes in the traditional way of taking notes. “So you said that you were within eyesight of your partner?”
“I was until I saw the man and moved toward him. I didn’t want to draw attention to my presence by calling for Karsyn, which was a blunder on my part. I should never have stepped away from Karsyn.”
Grant nods. “Mistakes happen. Okay, just let’s run through the body type of the person again. Height, approximately?”
My mind flashes over to River’s soft smile, dark hair, and rich brown eyes. I can describe him far too well. “Shorter than me but not by much. Maybe two inches.”
“Weight?”
“His clothes were very baggy, but I’d say average weight, maybe on the thin side. It was hard to tell with his clothes.”
Grant jots something down before tapping his pen against his chin. “So he was able to get you to his car, right? Can you tell me anything beyond it being a car? Color? Make? Model? Even whether it was a two or four door?”
I pretend to spend a long time thinking. River seems to drive two different cars, but I don’t know whose name this one is in and if it can be traced back to him. And how does he have the cars? If people think he’s dead… did he buy them? Some cash deal that left his name out of it? But then where’d he get the money?
“DeGray?” Foster asks gently.
I shake my head. “Sorry. Yeah, so um… I’m trying to think. Whatever that drug was, it was debilitating. I felt like everything became impossible to focus on. Did you ever figure out what it was?”
“They’re still working on what it might be,” Foster says. “But we’ll let you know as soon as we do.”
I nod, but now that they’re done with me, I’m not sure what to do. In the afternoon, Marcus ends up putting me on a different case, but my mind is wound up in this one. I just got done promising River I’d help him, and now I’m not allowed to touch the case with a ten-foot pole.
Thankfully, Brooks lets us go early since our previous night had led to little sleep, so I head to the florist and pick up some flowers for Dorothy. Then I drive to the hospital to sit with her.
When I walk in, she’s sleeping, so I take a seat and sit alone with my thoughts until she wakes up.
“Peter?” she asks.
“It’s Bentley,” I say.
“Ah, that’s right. Why do you look so thoughtful today?”
“Well… work’s been insane, and I’ve been dealing with some personal stuff.”
“The nurse is very cute. She’d liven you right up!”
I sigh, wondering when she’ll stop playing matchmaker. “You think all your nurses are cute,” I remind her.
She laughs. “Let’s hear it. What happened?”
So I tell her… some of it. I leave out a few pieces in case there are prying ears around, but I share enough. I know she won’t even remember by the time I see her again, but it feels nice to just be truthful with someone.
“So now you don’t know what to do because he’s dying?” she asks.
“I don’t know what to do about any of it. He’s a criminal, he’s dying, and I can’t stop thinking about all of it. My mind is a mess. A part of me feels like he deceived me, but another part knows he wasn’t malicious. But why do I think it wasn’t malicious?”
“Well… if you’re going to think about him anyway, why not enjoy it?” she asks.
“Because then I’ll be sadder when he dies.”
“I know death bothers you more than most because you feel like everyone around you dies. But didn’t the memories we have together outweigh the prospect of my death? Everyone dies, Benny. If you fixate on their death how will you ever enjoy their life?”
“I don’t want to be hurt again. I’m tired of being hurt,” I admit.
“Aren’t we all?” she asks. “So you might as well enjoy as much as you can! It doesn’t matter who you come to love or care about, you never know when they’re going to die.”
It’s different. It’s so much different because his life is just ticking away, and I can either walk away now or get more invested in it.
“Ooh! Were you going to read to me?” she asks. “I miss reading to my students. Do you think class will start back up again?”
“It’s still summer break.”
“Ah, right, but we need to pick the perfect book to start off the year with. The first one’s always the most important. Did you bring more choices?”
“I did,” I say as I pull them out. “Want to pick?”
She picks one about a boy going on an adventure, and I spend the next hour reading it to her.
OceanofPDF.com

CHAPTER FOURTEEN 
RIVER
“I’m surprised you came back,” I admit as Bentley walks through the door into my apartment.
“If anyone’s going to handcuff you, it’s going to be me,” he teases.
I try not to grin like a psychopath as he passes me. It’s probably a little off-putting how much I’m smiling but I can’t stop, and I guess if he can handle knowing I’m dying and a criminal he can handle some smiling. “I’m so happy you’re back and I’m trying to play it cool, but I can’t stop smiling at you.”
He starts laughing as he shuts the door. “So I’ve been at war with myself all day because you clearly like making my life difficult. And I still have no fucking idea what I’m doing, but I thought that since you… missed out on time with what happened to you, we could do all the things you wanted to do.”
I look at him in surprise. “I’m… supposed to be taking down a crime thingy, not… enjoying life.”
“No, the VRC is taking them down. You have to trust me that we’re going to do something. You don’t need to do this alone,” he says.
“They… they believed you? They’re going to do something?” I ask in surprise.
He gives me a reassuring smile. “Whether they believed me or not doesn’t matter. What you have to understand is that at the VRC, we don’t weigh our decisions on who we believe or trust, we weigh them on facts. And right now, that’s what we’re looking for. We’re going to find the facts and proof for all of this. Okay? For now, there’s nothing more we can do today anyway. I can assure you that you’ve harassed them enough that everyone’s going to be on high alert. The governor is locked down tight, as is probably everyone else who might be involved in this.”
I nod, understanding what he’s saying and knowing he’s right. This is his specialty. This is what they do, so there’s no reason not to trust him. “For now. For today, I’ll go along with this.”
“Okay. I want you to write down everything you were planning on doing. Like a bucket list,” he says as he reveals a notebook he must have brought with him.
“Fine,” I say as I take it and rip out a page. “But you have to too, then.”
He nods. “Okay. I can do that.”
We sit down at the table and Banshee sits in the spare chair so she can judge us. I rip out another piece of paper, ball it up, and set it before her. She smacks it around, pleased.
“We have five minutes,” I say.
“It doesn’t have to be a race but sure, I suppose I don’t mind winning.”
I grin at him. “The one with the most items wins, and we do one of them.”
“Okay… ready?”
“Yes.”
“Go!”
I stare down at the long blank piece of paper and hesitate. I mean… before the fake surgery, I had it all figured out… at least, I thought I did. We loved playing board games as a family, and we’d come together every Thursday no matter what we were doing to play. The next week was my brother’s choice, and I knew he was going to pick Monopoly because it was ridiculously long and he always won.
So I write down Monopoly.
I glance up at Bentley to find him hovered over the paper, writing away. How can he figure this out so quickly? How can I, after three minutes, only have Monopoly written down? Am I thinking too much? I think I’m getting caught up in my head.
Okay, okay. Let’s see…
And so I write. It’s slow going, but by the end of it, I have ten things written down.
“Want to share?” Bentley asks.
“Sure. You go first.”
“Okay. First up is that I want to take Dorothy out to see the sunset. She keeps complaining that the sunset is always on the wrong side of her room. You?”
“I want to play Monopoly. I hate the game so much, but it was the next game we were playing in our lineup of family games.”
“I also want to play Monopoly. I’ve never played it before and only heard about its ability to shatter family relationships.”
I snicker because our family was always so low-key about that kind of stuff. “Great. It’s not how you shatter relationships, it’s how you test how strong they are. Can they withstand Monopoly? Play and you’ll find out! Now your turn.”
“I want to figure out how to take care of fish so I don’t have to pay the neighbor to take care of them for me since I don’t want to lose a single one of Dorothy’s precious fish. Dorothy’s named them all. And you better bet that I can’t remember any of their names,” he says with a grin.
“You still overfeeding them?”
“No, I got scolded for that and have promised to never do it again. You?”
“I want to see you run naked down the street,” I say, just to see his reaction.
He shakes his head. “I mean, if it’s on the list, we have to do it. I want to take you some place you’ve never gone before.”
“Aw, yours is so sweet compared to what I want to do with you.”
“Hey, I never said I wanted to take you to a nice place you’ve never gone to before. Have you ever been to the dump?”
I grin at him. “No, but it sounds amazing if you’re the one taking me there. Okay. My next one is that I want to ride a bull for eight seconds. I’m not actually sure I want to do this, but it popped in my head and I was like, why not?”
He snickers. “That sounds entertaining, at least. Okay, Dorothy loves animals, so I want to smuggle an animal in for her to play with.”
“I…” My voice catches as I look down at the evil sentence. “I want to hear my mother’s voice,” I somehow manage to choke out. “I really want to tell them I’m alright… but I know I can’t.”
Bentley gives me a sad smile. “I’m sorry—”
I give him a look of alarm because he cannot apologize or the sadness will just smack me right in the face. “No! Don’t be sentimental or you’ll make my bravado weaken. Quick. Say something ridiculous.”
“Um… um… I want to go skydiving!”
“Perfect! But I won’t join you on that one. I want to sneak into an amusement park after hours.”
“You want to break in?” Bentley asks in surprise.
“It just… sounds really exciting and I’ve never done anything like ‘bad boy’ before,” I say. “I never even had a detention!”
The way Bentley narrows his eyes and cocks his head makes me laugh.
“Before all of this! I’m a good person. They’re assholes! They’ve murdered people. Don’t make me feel guilty,” I whine.
“I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair of me. I know. It’s quite often we are stuck doing questionable things to protect the ones we care about. Why don’t we get started on the list? Something simple. Monopoly!”
“I don’t have a board. Playing Monopoly with Banshee didn’t sound too fun so I never bought one.”
“Playing anything with that dem—cat doesn’t sound too fun. Hmm… well, the store’s right down the road, come on,” he says as he hops up and heads for the door. I hesitate before realizing that if a sexy man is asking me to head out to buy a Monopoly board with him, then I’m going to go get a Monopoly board.
As soon as we’re both seated in the car, he backs out and heads toward the store. “Just keep adding to the list, and we’ll try to knock a few out every day,” he says.
“Why are you so nice?” I ask suspiciously. “It has to be a trick, right? Is this like in Carrie and you’re going to dump pig blood on me?”
“Why would I waste perfectly good blood just to dump it on your head? Wait… are you expecting me to lick it off you or something?”
I grin at him. The idea of him licking me sounds quite tempting but if what he’s licking is blood I’m not quite sure I’m the man for the task. “I don’t know, it’s your fetish, not mine.”
Bentley shakes his head as he hangs a right. “Maybe it is, maybe it’s not. Maybe you just have to wait and see, dumpling.”
“And now you’re calling me food items again,” I say as I dramatically sigh.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, meat pie.”
“Dontcha, bat boy?”
He grins as he hits his left blinker but at the stop sign, he flicks it off and ends up going straight. It’s getting dark out, so I’m unsure what he’s doing until he pulls over and gets out of the car.
“What are you doing?” I ask suspiciously but still positive I’d follow this man to the ends of the earth for some reason.
“Come on.”
I jump out and follow him as he walks over to a fence. He grabs me around the waist and then we’re suddenly on the other side of the fence.
“Is this where you feast upon my blood?” I ask.
“Not yet.”
And that’s when I see them eyeing us. Dozens of eyes lock on to us as I stare at them uncertainly.
“I was kind of joking about the riding the bull thing, and I’m pretty sure this is illegal.” The cattle, already bored with us, go back to consuming grass.
“I know the person who owns them. She won’t care in the slightest,” he says as he heads toward the herd of cattle.
“She’s going to shoot us!” I say as I follow after him.
“You want to sneak into an amusement park, but this is too much?” he asks before he takes off at a jog. “Come on.”
“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” I say as I trail after him. “We’re going to get caught and probably shot and the cow’s going to kick me in the face.”
“Eight seconds is all you have to stay on for,” he says as he slows down since the cattle are watching us again and a vampire running at them would probably be a bit terrifying. There is clear confusion on their faces as the vampire and human creep toward them.
“Which one do you want?” he asks.
“Are any actually bulls?”
“Shhh, just pretend those droopy things are testicles.”
“Their udders?” I ask.
“Testicles.”
“Four of them?”
He looks so amused by this that I can’t keep the huge smile I’m wearing at bay. “Yep. Special bulls,” he says before pointing at a tall stout one who is scrutinizing us. “That one.”
Of course he points to the one with a clear look of murder in her eyes. “That one looks like it’s going to eat me!”
“That’s the goal. You want the meanest-looking one with the best buck.”
“Oh my god, I’m going to die here and now, aren’t I? All because of a stupid joke I made!”
“I’ll catch you unless her—I mean the bull’s buck is so powerful s—he shoots your body right through my arms and you splat onto the ground. Only one way to find out,” he says as he grabs me. “Ready?”
“There’s nothing to hang on to!”
“Use your imagination.”
“How do I hang on to my imagination? Oh my god, this thing’s going to murder me, isn’t it?”
Bentley shrugs. “This rock could murder you if you like tripped over it and slid under the cow’s hooves and she stomped on your face. Live a little. Are you ready?”
I mean, this is the last of my life we’re talking about. I need to live a little. I don’t want to die with regrets, and I know not doing it will be a regret. Well… doing it might also be a regret. “Let’s do it!” I decide.
He picks me up and sets me on the cow’s back. I try to cling to her as she lifts her leg. Can I wrap my arms around her neck? Will leaning forward allow her to buck me off faster? She’s going to throw me to the ground and trample me with her hooves. The herd will help her with my murder and all that will be left is little red hooves with the proof of my blood.
She throws her head down hard and I prepare for it, but… she just goes back to eating.
“I… I feel a little foolish,” I say as I realize how much I’m clinging onto this beast.
“You just have to wait it out. Eight… seven…”
“Oh my god. Don’t count! She’s not even moving!”
Bentley is trying his hardest not to laugh. “She’s like a vampire. She’s moving so fast you can’t even follow it with your eyes. Only three more seconds!”
Her tail swishes at a pesky bug and she stomps her hoof to get the fly to relocate.
“Do I at least look cool?”
“You look ridiculously sexy. Like a true cowboy.”
I’m laughing too hard now as she starts walking. “Oh my god! She was just waiting for me to lower my defenses! She’s going to kill me. Save me!”
She wanders about three feet over to a better stretch of grass and continues eating.
“What was that?” Bentley asks. “Your voice was so shrill it was hard to hear what you wanted.”
“Shhh.”
“How fast was she going there? It was like lightning. I could barely keep up with you,” he says, a huge grin on his handsome and irritating face.
“Yeah, well, it’s because you weren’t up here that you didn’t realize just how fast she was going.”
“In all my years, I’ve never seen anything faster. Even Marcus who is ancient can’t even move that fast.”
“I hope you step in cow shit,” I say as he laughs and laughs.
“If I were you, I would honestly consider a career in bull riding after this. You’re a natural, River.”
I slide off the cow and turn my back to Bentley. “Forget you,” I say as I pet the cow’s face. “You’re a nice little cow. Ferocious and fast, but nice.”
Her huge tongue stretches out and licks up my arm.
“Looks like you arrived a boy and are leaving a man,” Bentley says as I whirl on him.
“Alright, that’s enough! I’m going to end you!” I shout as I run toward him.
He rushes away from me, and even though I know there’s absolutely no way I can catch him, I still chase him through the field and back to the car. When I catch up, he’s chilling there, leaning against the car while checking his watch as I arrive slightly out of breath.
“Ah, finally decided to arrive, I see.”
“It was hard climbing the fence as you watched me struggle.”
He grins at me. “Off on our next adventure. To explore the grand world of Monop-oly.”
“Stop trying to make things sound more exciting than they actually are! Elongating syllables does nothing but make you seem like a weirdo.”
“Good, good,” he says, like he’s satisfied with being called that. He glances down and grins before pointing at his groin. “I like your fluff.”
I look down at all the white and black hair coating my black pants. “No! Now I have a hairy dick and ass. I just… wanted to be sexy for you for five minutes and I can’t even manage that.”
He doesn’t seem too concerned as he laughs his way into the car. We drive to the closest Walmart and get out before I stop him on his side.
“You know what you have to do,” I say, arms folded, feeling defiant.
“Go… get the board game?”
“No. Streak.”
“Oh lord. You want me to get fired, don’t you?”
“It’s harder for you to arrest me and expose my secret if you’re in prison,” I joke.
“Makes sense,” he says as he unbuttons his shirt and I realize that he’s really going to do it.
The look on my face is probably built off pure glee as I watch him toss his shirt inside and unbutton his pants. He raises an eyebrow before pushing his pants down so he’s just in his boxer briefs.
“You ready?” he asks before looking around to make sure no one is watching.
“Delightedly ready,” I say as I watch him yank his underwear off, but before I can see anything he’s zipped around the car and pulled half his clothes back on.
“Dammit, Bentley! I wanted to see the goods!”
“The goods flip-flopped all around as I toured the outside of the car,” he teases.
“Wow, that’s sexy. I’ve never had such a sexy pickup line before,” I say as he buttons his shirt before anyone notices us. “You know what this is like? The dollar store version of a bucket list.”
He starts laughing before grabbing me in his arms and pulling me to him. “No! I’m sorry! I’ll get you a bull and streak for real for you.”
I find myself sinking into his arms and grabbing desperately tight onto him. I hadn’t realized how much I’ve missed human—er… person contact. My family is an extremely huggy family, and I didn’t realize how much I could miss that. “And somehow this is all so much more superior than what I thought it’d be. I don’t want a bull. A docile cow was scary enough, and I don’t want you to rot in jail and lose your job. I honestly love this far too much.”
“Okay. But if you want to do any of it better, let me know,” he says as he pulls back from the hug.
“I don’t think it can get better.”