Chapter 11 - Chapter Eleven

The word worried was an enormous understatement to what Kieran and Jaxon were when Luca and Ari got back.

“WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN?” Kieran was yelling.

“DIDN’T IT EVEN OCCUR FOR YOU TO CALL?” Jaxon was shouting. “HOW HARD IS IT FOR YOU TO PICK UP THE PHONE AND DIAL?”

“Relax,” Luca soothed. “I told you I knew this town well, didn’t I? She was in safe hands, and look, I got her back in one piece.”

“YOU COULD HAVE STILL CALLED! DO YOU KNOW HOW FREAKING WORRIED WE WERE? YOU COULD HAVE BEEN MUGGED, OR RAPED, OR ROBBED, OR KILLED, OR…HARMED IN ANY OTHER WAY!” Kieran paused. “Did I mention you could have gotten raped?”

Luca winced. “Can you stop shouting? You’re hurting my ears. Besides, I’m pretty sure the chances of me getting raped is pretty slim. And as for getting robbed or mugged, I don’t think we’ll be having any trouble like that for a while.” He exchanged a look with Ari.

“I’m not sure I even want to know what that means,” Kieran said, groaning and collapsing onto the sofa.

“You are grounded. Both of you. And no, I don’t care if you don’t actually live with us, Luca. Now eat your dinner—that is, if you haven’t already had it—and go into your room, and stay there.” Jaxon slammed the door to his room.

Ari looked at Jaxon’s door, her mouth open. She turned to Kieran, confused. “Why is he so worried about it?”

“Because you could have been taken by Elli—that man and he could have killed you! We thought we’d lost your forever! And Luca, what the hell are we supposed to tell your parents if that happened? ‘Oh, I’m sorry, but he took off with our daughter and we think he’s been killed. If it helps, we think that’s what happened to our daughter as well’?!” Kieran walked over to Ari and gave her a hug. “Jaxon’s just really stressed right now. So am I, actually. So don’t pull any stunts until all this is over, okay?”

Ari sighed. “Okay. I’m sorry. We just…lost track of time.” She pulled away and frowned. “Did you just call me your daughter?”

Kieran bit his lip. “That’s what you are to me, and that’s what you are to Jaxon.”

Ari snorted. “Do you know how impossibly ridiculous you’d look? Two nineteen year olds showing up and saying exactly what you just said to a bunch of forty year olds.”

Kieran sighed. “It’s not even funny, Ari. Promise me this won’t happen again.”

“I promise.”

“And you, Luca?”

Luca raised an eyebrow. “I promise.”

“Good. Have you two had dinner?”

“No.”

Kieran handed them pieces of toast smothered with baked beans. “Now go into your room, and stay there. Maybe you guys should start packing. We’re leaving tomorrow.” Kieran smiled ruefully at them before disappearing into Jaxon’s room.

***

Fifteen minutes later, and Ari and Luca were in their room, Luca tickling Ari, grinning as she burst out into fits of laughter.

“Stop, don’t, stop, please,” she begged him through tears of laughter.

Luca grinned. “Beg.”

“I’m begging, I’m begging. Please, stop.” She rolled onto her side, hunched up, trying to escape from his fingers. He stopped tickling her for a moment, and she turned onto her back. He was suddenly leaning over her, his face only inches away from hers.

“Give me a good reason why I should stop,” he said in a low voice.

“Because…” Ari trailed off, desperately avoiding his gaze. “Because we should be packing.” She tried to inch herself out from under him, but his hand wrapped around her waist stopped her. “Let go of me,” she breathed.

Luca leaned in even closer. “And why should I do that?” he whispered,grinning, his breath hot on her lips. “I’m extremely comfortable.”

Ari smirked. “Let’s hold this a position for a few more minutes and hear you say that again.” She slapped the hand that was resting on her waist and pushed him away. “Go away. I have to pack.”

Luca was staring at his hand. “Did you just hit me?”

She rolled her eyes. “No, I didn’t, you were hallucinating.” She turned away from him and started taking out her clothes and folding them into neat piles. Luca appeared at her side wordlessly and started helping her.

“You know how to fold clothes?” Ari asked him, amazed.

Luca cocked an eyebrow. “I’m a boy, not a racoon.”

“Exactly. Boys don’t know how to fold clothes.”

“Well, you’re obviously wrong, aren’t you?” He didn’t tell her that he was the one that had to do the house chores when he was at home, and he knew everything from folding clothes to washing dishes to mopping the floor.

They finished packing in less than an hour, since they didn’t have that much belongings. “Well,” Ari breathed out a sigh of relief and collapsing onto the bed. “That’s finally done.”

Luca grinned. “Great. Now we can move on to other things.”

She sat up, frowning. “What other things?” she had barely got the words out of her mouth when he suddenly leapt onto the bed on top of her.

“What do you think?” He grinned.

She sat up. “Why are boys such…perverts?” she snapped.

Luca smiled lazily. “There’s a difference between being a pervert and being passionate.”

“Well, personally, I can’t see the difference.”

“That’s because you don’t try to. If you paid more attention, you’d see the difference. You’d see that I’m not a pervert.”

“How is it any of my business?”

“I want it to be your business,” Luca told her, leaning down close to her, and heat crept up to her cheeks. “I want you to care.”

Ari, with her back to the wall, looked at him and held his gaze. Just this once, she wasn’t going to surrender. She wasn’t going to lose track of herself. She wasn’t going to be hypnotised by those beautiful blue eyes. At least, she hoped not.

Luca tilted his head so that their lips were almost touching. Then after wavering for a moment, still holding her gaze, he gently pressed his lips against hers.

Heat burst through her, as she tried to keep herself controlled, but she could feel herself slipping away. Her breathing became erratic and she gasped for air, breathing against his lips, which stretched into a smile. He pulled away. “Was that…okay?” he asked hesitantly.

“Yes,” she breathed. “Yes, it was. Come back here.” Luca chuckled as Arianne pulled him closer, and he kissed her gently, with her head back against the wall. His lips lightly brushed hers, and he didn’t move. Arianne leant forward impatiently, and Luca laughed.

“Haven’t you heard of taking it slow before?” he asked her.

“I really don’t think that’s an option for me now that you’ve done that,” she breathed again.

He grinned. “As much as I’d like to uh, take it further along, I think you should calm down before you have an asthma attack.” He kissed her lightly on the cheek. “I’m going to brush my teeth.”

“But I’m not even asthmatic,” she called after him, and he replied with one of his half smiles before disappearing out of the room.

How irritating was that? She sighed in frustration and followed him into the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face.

***

“Jax?” Ari crept into Jaxon’s room. “I’m sorry.”

Jaxon was reading, and when he saw Ari, he put his book down and hugged her. “Promise me you won’t do that ever again,” he said to her after pulling away.

“I promise.”

“God, we were so worried. We though you’d been taken by…that man again.”

“I’m sorry. We just lost track of time.”

“You have to be careful of things like time, especially when it doesn’t matter in your case anymore.”

Ari didn’t really know what he meant, but she nodded anyway. “Goodnight, Jax.”

“Sweet dreams.” She left his room after he kissed her forehead.

When she returned to her room, she found—to her horror or delight, she didn’t know which—that Luca was shirtless.

“Where’s your shirt?” she asked him, dragging her eyes reluctantly away from his body. The room suddenly felt too small.

“I only packed enough shirts to last me for two or three days. It’s now, what, the fifth day? I’ve just washed them, and they’ll have dried by tomorrow. But for now…”

“Oh.”

He smirked. “Why, does the fact that I’m shirtless excite you?”

Arianne snorted. “Bother me, yes; make me uncomfortable, yes; excite me, hm, let me think. Uh, No.” Or maybe yes, she added silently. She turned away from him. “Is it me, or is it getting hotter in here?” she thought to herself.

“Turn around,” she commanded. “I have to change.”

“You tell me to turn around, and then you tell me have to change? Now I’m never going to turn around.”

Arianne pursed her lips and playfully thwacked him on the head. He ducked, grinning and grabbed her from behind, making her shriek and collapse into giggles.

He dropped her onto the bed. “Go on, then. Change.” He turned around. “I won’t peek. I promise. Scout’s honour.”

Arianne wrinkled her nose. “You were a scout?”

“No.”

Arianne grinned before undressing and pulling on a t-shirt of Ki’s that was way too big for her and came down to just above her knees. She loved that shirt. It smelled like Ki and she’d make him wear it after he washed it so it’d always smell like him. And he looked funny and very gay wearing a tight shirt.

“Done?” Luca asked her, turning around.

“Hey, I didn’t say I was done,” she protested.

“But you are.”

“But…oh shut up.” Her eyes widened as Luca stripped down to his boxers. “What the hell are you doing?”

Luca raised an eyebrow. “I usually sleep like this. Besides, it’s not like you have pyjamas for me to wear, do you?”

Ari dragged her gaze away. The room had suddenly risen a few degrees above the normal temperature. “You can’t wear that,” she mumbled. “I’m going to ask Kieran to get you something.” She rushed out of her room.

***

She came back with a pair of cotton sweat pants and flung them at Luca. “Wear this,” she said, still not looking at him.

“What, you’re just going to not look at me until I wear these?”

“Yep.” She turned off the light in the room, causing Luca to yelp and stumble around the room, and climbed into the bed.

After a minute or two, she felt him crawl into bed beside her. “Damn, it is dark in here,” he complained. “I nearly walked straight into a wall.”

She snorted. “Too bad you didn’t.”

“Oh, you wouldn’t want that.”

“Why not?”

“Because if I did, I wouldn’t be able to do this.” He kissed a line down her throat and back up to her ear. She shivered, making him chuckle.

She pushed him away. “Not here.”

“Why not?”

“Because Ki and Jax are going to check up on us and if they find us…you know…we’ll get into trouble.”

Right on cue, the bedroom door opened and Kieran walked in. “Kids?”

“Yes?” Ari asked him, shooting Luca a look that said I told you so.

“I would say that it’s time for bed, but you guys are already in bed.” He gave her a hug and kissed her forehead. “Goodnight, Ari.”

“Goodnight, Ki.”

Kieran nodded awkwardly at Luca. “Goodnight.”

“’Night.”

Kieran paused. “You don’t need a hug, right?”

“Please no.”

“Thank God.” Kieran left after giving Ari another quick kiss.

“See?” Arianne said as soon as their door was closed. “I told you.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Luca muttered, pulling her close to him.

She muffled a shriek. “Stop that,” she said, putting on a stern face but breaking into a smile despite herself. He was so gorgeous. And he liked her. Her. I mean, he was two, almost three years older than her, and there were truckloads of beautiful girls fawning over him, but she was the one he went after.

Which really wasn’t fair. To the girls, or her. It wasn’t fair for the girls because they were trying their very best, sidling up to his side and linking his arms with theirs, wearing their shortest skirts possible, and slathering on makeup as if their lives depended on it. It wasn’t fair for her because she was supposed to hate him, and he was dissolving that hate into…well, something else. Which really wasn’t fair, because she had been building up that hate for a long, long time, and he was making that disappear in less than a month.

“What are you thinking?” he murmured.

“A lot of things.”

“About?”

She shrugged. “Mostly you,” she said, smiling a smile she never knew she could smile.

He grinned right back at her. “Really. All good things, I hope.” He slid his arms around her.

Her eyes widened when he bent down to kiss her collarbone. “No, no,” she breathed. “Bad things. Definitely bad things.”

His grin got bigger. “Even better.”

She rolled her eyes, laughing as he pulled her in for a kiss.

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