His gaze burns into mine for a long moment.

"Right or not," he says finally, "that doesn't give me an excuse to be an a.s.shole."

"You were upset. I've said far worse things to you in the past."

"Still not an excuse. And I disagree that you've said anything worse." He leans forward and presses his forehead against mine. "You were just trying to help, and I didn't want to hear it."

"I was trying to protect you, that's all. I know how hard all this... this c.r.a.p can be." I reach up and press my hand against his cheek. "But I understand. Honestly, I do."

He's silent a moment. And then, "I can't think of anyone who would understand more." He kisses me gently. "No one." The corner of his mouth curls up. "I only take issue with one thing. I'm supposed to be protecting you, not the other way around."

I roll my eyes in exasperation, and he laughs and holds me against him.

"I mean it, though," he says. "Nothing else matters. Not what they say about me. Not what Carolson thinks about me. I don't give a s.h.i.t about any of it. Frankly, I don't give a s.h.i.t about anything but you."

He pulls my face closer.

"I love you, Lou," he says. "You're all that matters."

I don't even have a chance to register his words before he kisses me.

My whole body floods with heat. He loves me. He loves me!

I throw my arms around his neck and open my mouth beneath his, deepening the kiss. He groans and slips his arms around my waist.

He loves me. I can't get enough of that thought. And I know I told myself that I'd hide my true feelings, that I wouldn't let him see how much I want him and need him, but I don't have the strength to let his words go unanswered.

I tear my mouth away from his. "I love you, too. And I'm here for you, whatever you decide to do about your father."

"Good. Because I'm nowhere near done with you yet."

He crushes his mouth against mine again and yanks me hard to his chest. He grinds against me, and I can feel exactly how much he wants me.

A car honks right behind us, and I almost jump out of my skin. But then again, we are still in the middle of the parking lot.

Ward pulls back and flicks off the driver. I laugh.

"We're the ones in the wrong," I say.

"Doesn't matter." Ward grins. "Anyone who tries to keep me from kissing you is automatically on my s.h.i.t list."

Still, he guides me toward the curb. I expect him to lead me back to the car, but instead he continues in the direction of the convenience station.

And right toward the facility's only family-style bathroom.

The minute the door closes behind us, he has me up against the wall. My mouth searches for his, but he's trying to kiss me everywhere, moving his lips across my neck and jaw and cheeks. This time he's more careful around my bruise, but I feel a tremor go through his body as he kisses it, and there's something so intoxicating about his obvious restraint that I pull his face against mine. I don't care about the pain. I just want to be closer to him.

He growls and grabs the straps of my dress, pushing them down until he can free my b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He pinches my nipples, drawing them into points even as I go for his pants. The throbbing between my legs is already unbearable.

He kisses me and kisses me again, still rolling my nipples between his fingers, and just when I think I can't take anymore he reaches down and grabs my dress. He bunches the fabric around my waist as I push his jeans down to the floor.

I'm so sensitive right now that the first touch of his fingers against my c.l.i.t sends stars across my vision. He slides his hand along the length of me, caressing and teasing with his usual skill. I whimper and reach for his c.o.c.k.

I don't even hear the door rattle. But Ward does, because he pulls back and grabs the handle just in time to keep it from flying open.

"Occupied!" he calls to whatever poor, unsuspecting soul nearly walked in on us. And then he flicks the lock and grabs me again in one motion, pushing me back up against the wall.

My fingers drop to his c.o.c.k again, and my hand slides up and down the velvety skin. His mouth makes a path down my throat. He nips at me as I stroke him, and when I give him a particularly aggressive squeeze, he bites down hard enough to make me gasp.

He only pauses once, to reach down to the floor and scrabble for the pocket of his jeans. To get a condom.

The pill, I remember suddenly. We forgot to stop for the morning-after pill. But before I can work out whether or not we still have time, his tongue is invading my mouth again, and I push the thought aside. What harm could another hour do?

As soon as the condom is on, he grabs me and lifts me off the floor.

"Legs around me," he orders.

I obey.

He shoves my back up against the wall. His hand moves down my belly, and then he slips his thumb between us, right where we're pressed together. When he finds my c.l.i.t, I cry out-then bite down on my bottom lip.

"Don't go shy on me now," he breathes. "Go crazy. Let everyone out there hear." He begins to move his thumb in small circles, and I throw back my head and moan.

When I let out a particularly loud sound of pleasure, he abruptly pulls back his hand. He shifts himself so that his c.o.c.k presses against my entrance.

His eyes lock on mine. I hold his gaze as he slowly slides into me.

"I love you," I tell him when he's all the way inside of me. "I love you, Ward." I want to tell him over and over and over again.

He kisses me, and when he pulls back again, his eyes are full of fire.

"I love you, too," he says. "And I intend to show you just how much."

He rocks against me. Slowly. And he continues to look at me with a desire that burns deep into me, all the way down to that place where I'm most exposed, where all of the intense, tumultuous emotions I've been feeling since we fled Huntington Manor bleed together into something beautiful and raw.

"I knew from the beginning," he says breathlessly as he slowly increases the speed of his thrusts. "I knew you'd undo me."

I cling to him, my gaze never wavering from his.

"I knew it," he continues to growl. He rocks into me again and again, and he's pushing me so roughly up against the wall that I'm afraid we're going to crack the tile.

But nothing-nothing-could make me stop him right now. He's mine, and I'm his. Completely. I want him to have all of me, in any way he wants.

When I can feel myself building to my peak, I lean forward and capture his lips with mine. I want to be linked to him in every way possible when I explode.

And I am. He knows my body too well, because his tongue slips into my mouth at the exact moment I fall over the edge. I gasp against his lips and give myself over to the ecstasy as it ripples through my body.

He loses it, too, nearly dropping me as his own climax comes. I let my legs fall back to the ground, and we both stand there against the wall, holding each other and panting.

"You're everything," he rasps into my ear. "f.u.c.k everything else. f.u.c.k it all."

CHAPTER EIGHT.

I tell myself that Ward and I are ready for anything, that no number of magazine articles or posts on gossip sites will shake us. Let them say what they want. Let them speculate about our relationship and dig up our secrets. It won't change how Ward and I feel about each other.

But I'm used to this. Not that you ever really get used to that sort of attention-but at the very least, I've learned how to live with it. It never stops being strange seeing your face on the cover of a magazine.

Ward, on the other hand, is dealing with this for the first time.

The day after I tell him about Look! Magazine, we stop at a gas station to refill and pick up some snacks. I slip away to the bathroom, and when I return to the front of the convenience store, I find Ward looking through the racks of magazines.

He has the latest issue of Look! in his hands, and he stares down at the cover for a long time before flipping it open and finding the article. I don't try to stop him. He needs to see it for himself.

His shoulders tense as he reads, and even from where I stand, I can see the knuckles on his hands go white as his grip tightens on the pages. He flips through the article twice, and by the end of his second read-through, there's a vein pulsing at his temple. He closes the magazine and puts it back on the rack, then turns and finds me watching him.

He makes a half-hearted attempt to smile. "I guess this is what it's like to be famous, huh?"

"More or less."

"At least most celebrities get perks," he says. "Like fancy cars and mounds of cash. I imagine that makes the whole thing more bearable."

I press my lips together, and his eyes widen as he realizes what he's said.

"That was supposed to be a joke," he says. "I don't actually believe money makes it easier."

With as complicated as things have been between us, his offhand comment doesn't bother me as much as it once might have.

"No, money definitely makes things easier," I say. "At least in some respects." The fact that I can say that without experiencing a sudden rush of guilt is very strange.

He touches me on the cheek, and I smile to show him that I'm all right. He studies my face for a moment and then nods, apparently satisfied with his a.s.sessment.

"I'm grabbing some chips," I tell him. "Want anything in particular?"

He shakes his head. "Get whatever you want."

If you told me two years ago that I'd be on the run and regularly picking out dinner from the snack aisle at gas stations, I would have laughed. If you told me a month ago that my future would be so closely intertwined with Ward's, or that I'd find myself irrevocably in love with him, I never would have believed you.

Now, as I steal looks at him over the shelves, I'm a little stunned at how quickly I've grown accustomed to this new life. A week ago, I cringed at the idea of eating something from a place like this-between the sticky floors, the stale cigarette smell, and the three-day-old hot dogs sitting under a heat lamp against the wall, even the pre-packaged snacks seemed questionable-but now, I have no problem with it whatsoever. None of these places seem half as grungy or scary as they once did. Even the idea of spending another night in a motel doesn't seem horrifying anymore.

It's because of Ward, that much I know. Maybe, with him by my side, there's hope for me becoming a normal human being.

Of course, that idea of "normal" disregards the small fact that the police are after me. And the fact that Ward and his billionaire of a biological father are on the verge of a ma.s.sive public scandal. But I'll take what I can get.

Ward is walking over to the cashier, so I grab a bag of chips and some granola bars and join him. It's not until I'm right next to him that I see what he's set on the counter. It's Look! Magazine.

"You're buying it?" I say in surprise.

He shrugs. "I need to."

Now I understand how he felt when I insisted on reading that newspaper back at Big Pig's Smokehouse. I itch to grab the magazine off the counter, to run across the store and shove it back on the magazine rack. But I close my hands into fists and stay silent.

He needs to figure out how to deal with this.

The cashier-a young woman with curly hair and fuchsia lipstick-is giving us a funny look. Probably because of the giant bruise on my face. The color is still pretty bad, even if the swelling has gone down, but I'm tired of waiting in the car while Ward interacts with the rest of the world. I pa.s.s the food across the counter and pretend not to notice her staring. Ward must notice it too because his hand brushes against mine. I slip my fingers through his and look back at the woman behind the counter. I'm not ashamed to be here with Ward.

But she's not staring at me anymore. Instead, she's looking at the magazine. At the giant pictures of our faces on the front.

We couldn't have made it easier for her if we tried.

"Hey," she says, tapping her acrylic nails against the cover. "You two look a lot like these guys."

Ward's grip tightens almost imperceptibly as the woman looks us over again.

"Hey, hear that, honey?" he asks me lightly. "We could be famous."

I laugh. It sounds fake, but the cashier doesn't seem to notice. If anything, she already looks bored again.

"Well, you'd have to clean yourselves up a bit," she says with a shrug. "People say I look like that chick from that cop show. You know, the one that takes place down in Dallas?"

"Oh, yeah. I love that show," Ward says, leaning forward across the counter. "I definitely see it. It's the eyes. "

The woman blushes a little, and I give Ward a little kick. He flashes me a smile before taking our bag from the cashier.

"Thanks," he tells her cheerfully. "Have fun hunting down those dangerous criminals."

Her cheeks redden further, and I squeeze Ward's hand more tightly than necessary as I drag him back outside.

"What?" he says with a laugh as we climb back into the car.

I roll my eyes. "You know what. I know that could have been a sticky situation back there, but I don't think it was necessary to flirt with her."

He grins. "Jealous? In my experience, some well-timed flirting can get you out of a lot of things."

"Mm, I'll remember that the next time some hunky cop pulls you over."

He laughs and pulls me toward him. His lips come down on mine.

"There's no one else but you," he says.

I draw back so I can look him in the eyes.

"I know," I whisper.