Read Online At the Edge by Laura Griffin - Free Book Online

smiled in the darkness. Most women wouldn’t consider Hunter a loser by any stretch of the imagination. He was smart and nice-looking and had a well-paying job. Everything about their relationship had been so easy and drama-free, right until he’d broken up with her. He’d even been low-key about that, too, as though he were canceling a prom date and not the rest of their lives together. It was his mother who had flipped out.
    Ryan shifted under her, and she felt the hard lump of the pistol holstered at his thigh, which quickly snapped her back to the present.
    â€œWhat about you?” she asked, wanting to continue with the distractions. “What’s the worst thing you’ve ever experienced?”
    He got very still. “Losing my sister.”
    Emma’s heart clenched. She didn’t need to ask if he was serious; she could hear it in his voice. “What happened?” she asked, because no matter what people thought, changing the subject didn’t make it easier.
    â€œLeukemia.”
    So much bitterness loaded into that one word.
    Emma’s heart was beating faster now. She hurt for him. She knew that kind of pain, and it never went away. It just became a steady ache.
    â€œI’m sorry,” she whispered.
    â€œThanks.”
    She shivered, but it was from emotion this time instead of chill.
    â€œYou still cold?” His hands moved up her arms again.
    â€œA little.”
    She rested her head on his pack. It smelled like him—masculine and earthy. She inhaled deeply and felt his thighs shift beneath her. She was going to put his legs to sleep. But he’d dragged her up here, hadn’t he? So he’d just have to put up with it.
    She liked being with him. Liked talking to him. So many awful things had happened, so many unspeakable, horrible things in the last twenty-four hours. And she hadn’t even really absorbed them all. She felt this dizzying churn of emotions inside her, and even the simplest things—like peeing in the woods—seemed terrifying. But when he touched her, she felt shielded from all of it.
    He continued his movements, stroking heat into her body. His palms felt warm and firm, and his steady breathing was like a drug to her system. She should really move away and let him get some rest, too. But her eyelids were impossibly heavy, and she didn’t want to move onto the cold, hard ground again.
    She took in a long, deep breath of him and closed her eyes.
    â€”——
    Ryan knew the instant she fell asleep. Her breathing steadied, her body went lax, and the heat of her skin seeped into his bones.
    He couldn’t believe he’d done this to himself. He’d hauled her onto his lap, and now he was going to have to spend the next hour in hell.
    He tipped his head back against the tree trunk and tried to think about the rain and the ants and the burning hunger in his belly—anything besides that barely-there scent of coconut that was driving him crazy. He wanted to scoop a fistful of her hair into his face, but she’d probably reach up and slap him, and he wouldn’t blame her a damn bit.
    Fuck.
    The thought of her slapping him didn’t help at all. It was actually kind of hot.
    He closed his eyes. He went back over the operation and through the list of boneheaded decisions that had gotten him to this point.
    For starters, he’d assigned himself the eastern search quadrant, knowing that gave him the highest probability of finding her. When he had found her, he’d disregarded all mission discipline and allowed himself to look at her as a woman and not some crash survivor he needed to rescue. And then he’d compounded that mistake by letting her sweet-talk him into staying here alone with her.
    And if all that weren’t bad enough? He’d started getting personal with her until their entire conversation was reduced to whispers in the dark.
    She shifted on his legs, and Ryan’s gut clenched.