Page 79 of Nyx
I flip his hand and stare at the dots of green that scatter over his thumb and the pads of his fingers, tracing the shapes as he kisses my jaw again. “You are my whole world, Nyx.” Gods, I can’t get enough of him and the easy way he loves me. I twist my head, pressing my lips to his with a quiet, happy hum.
“We canhear you,” Ronan complains from the driver’s seat, and Reyes rumbles a frustrated growl as he pulls away.
“You can choose to ignore us,” he says, and Xeni chuckles from the passenger side.
“Kinda hard with the noises you’re making back there,” Xeni teases, and Reyes’s lips twitch as he tries not to smile.
“Perverts,” I mutter, and Reyes loses all control with a loud laugh that pushes from his belly. Xeni joins in, and I can tell from the way Ronan’s cheeks lift he’s fighting his own laughter.
“You never told me who taught you that,” Ronan muses, his eyes meeting mine in the rearview mirror. I only shrug, and he scoffs. “Had to be Elas.”
“Birdie,” I say, and his brows shoot up to his hairline.
“What?”
Reyes snorts a laugh as he weaves our fingers together. “A little birdie told him. It’s as plausible as anything else.” The trees finally give way to the barren soil beyond our hidden cluster of paradise, and Ronan stops the van at the edge of the canopy. He climbs out and checks for wanderers or other prying eyes. When he’s satisfied there isn’t a threat, we continue on our journey.
I stare out the window, looking for anything familiar in the dry landscape, but it’s an endless sea of cracked clay dirt and blue, cloudless skies. Aside from our forest, there’s very little vegetation to be found. Without the plants surrounding me, I realize how much they comfort me. I remember very little of the drive here. The entire day is a blur in my mind—a scattered series of memories, and there are pieces too painful to revisit.
I never thought I’d be grateful for the hell I lived through, but as I turn to rest my cheek on Reyes’s chest, I am.
It led me here.
Reyes squeezes my hand, and I trace along the fabric of his shirt, smiling to myself at the hair underneath. “I brought something,” he says, reaching under the seat and pulling out a book. It isn’t one of the naked man books, but one with a human in a long coat, wearing a funny hat. “It’s a mystery. The story is about a detective.”
“Detective?” I sound the word out, and he tilts his head from side to side as he considers how to explain.
“A detective is someone who finds things. They search for answers.” My interest is piqued as I take the book. I pull the worn cover closer, examining the details ofthe picture before opening to a random page. The symbols are jumbled and confusing, so I slam it shut and thrust it back into his hands.
Reyes swipes his thumb over my fingers as he takes it. “I thought I might read to you.”
“Out loud?” I ask, my gaze moving up to his, and he gives me a soft smile and a nod.
“It’s a long drive, and I think you’ll like the story.”
My eyes dart between Ronan and Xeni in the front seat, and some of that familiar shame builds in my stomach. “We don’t… you don’t have to. For me. Just because… I don’t want to… to bother.”
“We don’t mind,” Ronan says softly, and Xeni shoots him a glance for answering for them both, but he cranes his head and meets my gaze.
“As long as Reyes does the voices properly,” he teases, and I offer him a shaky smile that feels like a truce. We were never enemies, he and I, but we were standing on opposite sides of an obvious line in the sand. Him versus me, us versus them, but that division is no longer clear. Suddenly we stand on the same side of that blurred line, and grudges are fruitless.
“If you want, I can hand it to you when it’s time for the broody parts,” Reyes says, and Xeni surprises me when he grins wider.
“But then what would Ronan read?” Xeni asks, and Ronan scoffs as he flips his hair over his shoulder, not sparing them a glance as we crawl over the bumpy terrain.
“Drama queen parts,” I answer, and this time, Ronan can’t hold in his laughter. It fills the van, coming from all four of us.
“Now Iknowit was Cameron or Elas that taught you that one.”
“Reyes,” I respond without thinking, and Reyes squeaks beside me as Ronan’s eyes find him in the mirror and narrow.
“Damn,” Reyes says, and Xeni laughs harder.
“Sorry,” I say, tugging on his shirt and forcing his eyes back to mine as Ronan continues to glare. “I did not mean to… hit you with a bus.”
“Throw me under the bus,” he corrects with a blinding smile, and presses a soft kiss on my lips. “Don’t worry. Ronan’s all bark.”
“All… bark?”
