Page 112 of Windlass

“I don’t think so.”

Thinkso wasn’t comforting.

“Did they care?” she asked.

“They had opinions,” said Angie, confirming Stevie’s fears. “Mostly about whether or not I’m a coward.”

Stevie squeezed their linked hands. “You’re one of the bravest people I know, stupid.”

Angie turned her head to the side. Her profile radiated vulnerability.

“I mean it.”

The grass brought out the green in Angie’s hazel eyes. Stevie’s heart beat like a drum.

Without meeting Stevie’s eyes, Angie said, “I’m trying.”

“I know.” And she did—more than Angie thought, Stevie guessed, because Angie didn’t know how much she communicated without words.

“Just . . .” Stevie trailed off as she searched for more adequate words. She found none. “Just stay, Ange. Try to stay.”

Angie’s nod was minute, but it was there.

Gently, so gently she didn’t realize what was happening at first, Angie’s teeth closed over Stevie’s lower lip. She froze. Each sensation, acute to the point of pain, radiated through her body. It was bliss. It was penitentiary. It tasted terrifyingly like home.

Stevie kissed her. Not fully—merely a desperate sweep of her mouth over Angie’s before she flung herself away and onto her back, breathing like she’d run a race. Angie’s hand found hers in the grass and clutched it.

The sound of clapping strengthened now that Angie wasn’t overpowering all her senses. She raised her head and saw their friends leaning on their mallets, gazing at them with affection as they gave Stevie and Angie a round of applause.

“About damn time,” Stormy shouted.

Stevie sought out Morgan’s eyes. Morgan stood with her arm around Emilia’s waist, faint worry in her smile, but not as much as Stevie expected. Ivy, on the other hand, smiled broadly. Stevie flipped them all off and stood, trying to ignore the burning between her thighs and the ache in her chest.

More than that, though, was the memory of Angie’s mouth beneath hers and the tiny nod.

Chapter Seventeen

Angie leaned back as Stevie dropped her towel, her shower-darkened blond hair dripping down her shoulders and sending little rills running over her breasts. The urge to lick the water droplets from Stevie’s body was stronger than the ever-present urge to run.

And if she did run? Would she return, stuck like a comet in Stevie’s gravity because Stevie was the closest thing to safety she’d known in years? What did it even mean to try as her friends had suggested? How was she supposed to let go of the instinct that had driven her all her life and had more than once saved her life? How did a personstay? Stevie stared at Angie for another heartbeat, her eyes asking a question Angie wasn’t sure she could answer. Not quite yet. She uncrossed her legs just enough to hint at what Stevie might have instead. Her body had always outperformed her words.

Stevie’s eyes hardened into a decisiveness that sent a wave of slick heat between her thighs and a tremor through the secret room she kept locked in the back of her mind. Luckily, there wasn’t time for self-analysis. Stevie crossed the floor and pushed her back on the bed, her hands pinning Angie’s biceps to the comforter. The feel of Stevie between her legs was exquisite. She burned as hot as Angie, and Angie arched into her. If Stevie would just toss Angie’s legs over her shoulders, they could—

Stevie’s mouth found her ear and wiped sense from her mind, stopping only long enough for Stevie to reach into the bag at the side of the bed and step hastily into her strap-on harness.

Angie sat up to help fasten the straps, which were as blue as the toy itself. It looked new. She didn’t care if it was or not, she . . .

Couldn’t finish the lie. She cared deeply. She didn’t want Stevie looking at anyone else the way she was currently looking at Angie.Ever. God, she was such a liar. She could never stand by and watch Stevie fall in love with someone else. Stevie washers, possessiveness be damned.

Something glimmered darkly in Stevie’s hand: a coil of sleek black rope.

“Stephanie Ward,” Angie murmured, expecting Stevie to blush. “You knotty girl.”

Stevie did not blush, her grin absolutely wicked. “Pun intended.”

That grin undid her. Her throat was nearly too tight to breathe. This need was new. In her previous experience rope play had been cathartic, but always edged with distrust. No doubt a therapist would have an opinion about that. This, though, was a new feeling. She couldn’t qualify it.

Stevie unspooled the rope and fiddled with a knot. When she’d finished, Angie recognized a basic handcuff tie.

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