Total pages in book: 29
Estimated words: 26493 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 132(@200wpm)___ 106(@250wpm)___ 88(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 26493 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 132(@200wpm)___ 106(@250wpm)___ 88(@300wpm)
I curve my hand around her jaw, forcing her to look at me. "It isn't stupid, Madeline. And it is a big deal. You were a teenager and in an environment where people in terrifying costumes were tormenting you with the sole purpose of scaring you. Your asshole father never should have put you in that position."
Most of those places—the responsible ones, at least—don't allow kids in specifically because they're so goddamn terrifying. The fact that her father signed a waiver allowing her to go in just to spite her mother is beyond horrific. It's fucking abusive. I don't know the man, but I already hate him. She deserved his protection, not that.
I was bullied by kids. She was traumatized by adults who should have known better. There is no comparison. And still, she dived right into trying to salvage this holiday for me, ignoring her feelings and trauma surrounding it. Because she wanted to make it better for me.
Christ, she's incredible.
Now, it's my turn to salvage some of it for her.
Fuck. I hope she finds this funny and doesn't think I'm a raging asshole.
"Do you trust me, unicorn?" I ask, stroking my fingers along her cheek.
"The jury is still out," she mutters, narrowing her eyes at me.
"I'm being serious, baby. Do you trust me to ensure that nothing bad happens to you? Because I won't allow anything to hurt you. I swear to you, I won't."
Hell will freeze over before I let anything happen to her. I've never needed much, but I need her, and I need her trust. Everything in me craves both on a level that's completely foreign to me. At this point, there isn't much I wouldn't do for her.
I don't need a lifetime to figure it out. Hell, I don't need weeks or months or years. Some shit is instinctive. This is one of those things. She is mine. Mine to protect. Mine to love. Mine in every goddamn way. I was meant to find her tonight. I feel it in my fucking bones.
She studies me for a heartbeat, her expression softening. "I trust you, Drake."
"Good." My fucking heart grows six sizes at her sweet confirmation. "Then I want you to close your eyes and press your face up against my throat. I'll carry you through the cemetery, and you won't have to see a single second of it. But I do want you to see what's on the other side."
Now, more than ever, I want her to see it. It's another secret I've never shared with anyone.
She hesitates for a split second and then nods bravely. "Okay." Her teeth immediately sink into her bottom lip. "But if I die in a graveyard, I will find you, and I will haunt you."
"You aren't dying in a graveyard. You aren't dying at all." I tap her button nose. "Close your eyes, pretty unicorn."
They reluctantly flutter closed.
I tuck her carefully up against my chest, gently pressing her face against my throat, and striding toward the cemetery. She's rigid in my arms, clearly not relaxed. Neither am I. Not with her lips against my throat. Not with every sweet breath pelting my skin. Not with her in my arms, so fucking soft and sweet.
But I grit my teeth against my body's reaction to her and stride forward. I parked facing the cemetery and left the lights on so we'd be able to see. There isn't much else out here to light the way. But with the lights of the truck and the moonlight, I find the path easily.
"I've been coming out here for years," I murmur to her. "I don't think anyone else in town even remembers this place exists. The people buried here died so long ago that they don't get visitors anymore."
"That's sad," she whispers.
"Yeah, it is. I keep the place cleaned up so it doesn't run wild. Figure someone should do it."
She relaxes slightly, melting into me.
"My favorite grave belongs to an old man named Bitter Smithers."
"That is not his name."
"I swear to you, it is," I say, chuckling at her scandalized tone. "And judging by his epitaph, the name fit the man, unicorn."
"What does it say?"
"Damn you to hell."
She giggles softly.
"He was one of the original founders of Midnight Falls, but he was a cranky bastard by all accounts. He hated everyone, and everyone hated him. I'm not entirely sure if the epitaph was his idea or someone else's."
I cross the last few feet of the cemetery and step through the rusty gate on the far side, moving carefully through a copse of trees and into the lot beyond.
The headlights don't penetrate on this side, but an old streetlight shines down on the overgrown lot, enough for her to see what we came to see.
I position her just right and then press my lips to her ear. "You can open your eyes now, unicorn."