Page 79 of Hopeless
I can’t let it go.
“Don’t be impulsive,” Bailey adds as I turn abruptly.
My eyes land on the girl, and she flicks her long blonde hair over her shoulder like her cruelty might impress me.
Fuck her.
I slip into that eerily cool, calculated zone I know all too well. My gaze cuts through the crowd, and I swear I’m seeing at them all through the crosshairs of a rifles cope. I point at the girl, singling her out, and project my voice, enunciating every word very carefully.
“Talk shit about my fiancée again. I fucking dare you.”
Bailey shrinks, but the girl who said it just looks … confused.
I stare hard, not at all uncomfortable in the awkward silence. And when no apologies come, I shake my head at all of them and lead my girl away from the confrontation.
“Beau, you shouldn’t have done that just now,” Bailey whispers tersely.
“You’re right. I should have started doing it a long time ago,” I grit out as I set my sights on the Ferris wheel.
Bailey doesn’t respond, and she stays silent as we wait in line. When we step onto our square and open-air capsule, Bailey instantly dives for the bench across from me. She seats the massive raccoon beside herself so that I’m forced to sit facing her.
I stare at her profile. The feminine line of her jaw, accentuated by the way she’s turned her head to gaze out over the town. The slope of her nose. The unnatural way that she avoids blinking.
She’d be terrible undercover. She looks like a deer caught in headlights, frozen and unmoving.
Our unit moves jerkily, stopping and going as they load other riders into the seats. Bailey still doesn’t look at me, even when we reach halfway up one side of the massive circle.
“Bailey.”
“Mm-hmm.” She crosses her arms as though that could keep me out.
“Come here.”
“I’m fine. My trash panda and I have heard worse. It barely hurts anymore.” She turns now, giving me the stiffest smile I’ve ever seen on her face. “Gets easier to brush off every time.”
Her eyes peek up and to the right. A dead giveaway that she’s lying.
In fact, I get the sense this shit is getting harder to brush off all the time. And I’m not sure if our arrangement is making her feel better or causing her more distress because people still seem to think it’s open season for insulting her.
“Come. Here.” I fold my hand, ushering her forward.
“No, thanks,” she replies, not taking her eyes off the horizon.
“For crying out loud, Bailey,” I grumble as I stand, grab her by the waist, and fall back into my seat with her straddling my lap.
“What are you doing?” Her expression is one of shock as the pod swings back and forth wildly. They mentioned not standing, but fuck that. She needed to be held.
“Holding my fiancée.” I settle my hands on her hips, fingers splaying dangerously low over the top of her ass. We both glance down, acutely aware of the way we’re lined up right now. Her thighs on either side of mine, the hemline of her dress edged up over them.
She swallows, hands on my shoulders. “I said no.”
“Okay.” Her chest rises and falls as her breathing picks up. I know what I do to Bailey. I’m just so fucking torn about whether or not I should be doing it. “Then go sit back over there, if that’s what you want.”
She clears her throat and stares at the view like there’s something fucking interesting out there when we both know it’s just a lot of flat farmlands. “We’re not supposed to stand up.”
I almost laugh. We both know what’s going on here. Age difference be damned. Bet be damned. Bailey and I like each other. We want each other. But we both know we shouldn’t complicate things when this agreement has a pretty firm end date. There’s a pretty obvious parting of ways on the horizon. One that doesn’t feel very amusing at all.
So, I don’t laugh. I dip my head forward and press a soft kiss to the center of her chest, just beneath where her collarbones meet.
