Page 33 of Deception
“I have to go,” he whispers as he presses his forehead to hers. “If I don’t leave soon, it’ll be impossible to peel me off of you.”
“You like me that much, huh?” she jokes.
His eyes lock with hers. “You have no idea. Go out with me again. I want to take you out for a nighttime picnic under the stars.”
“Can we take your bike?”
“Whatever you like.”
She nods and lets him set her down. “Kent?”
“Yeah?” he asks as he turns on the porch to look at her.
“I had a great time tonight.”
“Me, too, kid.”
The nickname makes her smile. He calls her that a lot. “Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, Gracie.”
He leaves, and she pants as she rests against the door. It feels dangerous to like him as much as she does, and she worries she’ll get hurt. It would have her changing her mind, but she knows not taking this chance would be one of the biggest regrets of her life.
Chapter Eleven
Griffin’s Beach
Venom
Coming home from a run, Venom stops at the store to pick up flowers for his girl waiting for him at home. Things between Venom and Marnie Banks have been a dream since they decided to give their relationship a real shot. Not quick and dirty fucking in the dark corners of the clubhouse, but a real, honest relationship.
In Summerville, Marnie was concerned about what her father would think, and she broke his damn heart when she agreed with Snake that Venom was dirt. He thought he could get over her, but thank God she followed him to show him how wrong she was.
He’d resisted at first, but he almost lost her. The De-Identifier almost killed her for being able to identify him, and it shifted Venom’s entire world. He knew he couldn’t live without her any longer, and he gave in. Put the past in the past.
He walks out of the store with the roses and carefully straps them to his bike.
“William!”
Venom’s head snaps up. There are only a handful of people who know his real name, and his breath disappears when he sees the one person he wishes he never had to see again. “Raena?”
“I looked for you in Summerville, but they said you moved here.”
His stomach drops. She came looking for him. This cannot be good.
“Why were you looking for me?”
“I need your help with something.”
Words I’ve heard too many times throughout my life.“And that would be…?”
She closes the gap between them, and he looks down at her fried, brown hair. Too cheap to go to a salon, she covers her grays with boxed dye from the dollar store, and she wears too much makeup that only emphasizes her wrinkles from age and sun exposure.
Just like Venom, she’s thin, but she has a small pouch around the middle. Her clothes are far too tight for a woman her age, and her slight limp shows the years of abuse have taken their toll on her aging body.
“I need you totake careof my husband.”
“Danny?”
