freshman year.”
“That’s a lot of moving around.”
“Like I said…” He raked a hand through his hair, grinning at me. “I don’t get attached to places. I go the opposite.”
“What do you mean?”
“I get attached to people.”
He looked right at me as he said that, and my entire body warmed. I swallowed over a knot in my throat. “Who are you attached to?”
“Nope.” He laughed softly and grabbed my hand.
I held my breath at the touch.
He pulled me forward. “That’s enough reveal talk for now. Come on. I want to show you my favorite place.”
He led me through the rides until we came to the roller coaster. When he started through the gate toward the track, I stopped. “Nope. No way.” I shook my head.
“It’s safe.”
“Doesn’t matter. No way.” I held my hands up and took a step backward. “I escaped death once. I don’t want to revisit that feeling.” Logan’s eyes widened at my words, and I could’ve hit myself. I cringed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that, but—”
He waved that away. “I said some stuff. You said some stuff. We’ll have sex and cuddle later. Everything’s good.”
I laughed. “You’re pretty damn sure.” His gaze sharpened, and I got the distinct feeling he was looking into me. He was seeing past my walls.
“We both knew where we were going to end up tonight when you opened the door,” he murmured. “I saw the look on your face, too.”
The air shifted. I’d been aware of him since he got to my house, and he was right. As he said those words, everything got hotter. I always felt pulled to Logan—I had since I first met him—and that pull was almost irresistible right now.
I coughed, forcing myself to look away. “Maybe.” I moved ahead of him, going through the gate toward the roller coaster track.
“Maybe?”
I grinned over my shoulder. “I just don’t want you to get too cocky.”
He groaned, tipping his head back for a moment. “Too cocky? Taylor, I’m not being cocky. I’m just stating the fact.”
“You’re not cocky?”
He came over, holding my gaze, and leaned close. I stood firm, holding my breath, as his lips came close to mine. He stopped an inch away, but I could feel his body heat, and I fought the urge to grab hold of him. This guy. I was almost panting for him, and he knew it. I saw the smug look in his dark eyes, and that made me want him even more.
He grinned. “You think I’m too cocky?”
“I know you are.”
“That just means I’ll have to prove myself all over again tonight.”
My blood began to sizzle. It was coursing through me, and I bit my lip. I had forgotten what we were even talking about. I leaned toward him. My body rested against his, and those lips—I grew closer and closer. Just a few centimeters held me away. My lips brushed his, but I caught myself.
He was going to prove himself tonight?
I gulped. God, yes.
“Firecracker,” he whispered.
I loved how he said my nickname. I had, all month long. I felt drunk as I asked, “Yeah?”
His eyes went from my lips to my eyes and back, again and again. My brain shut off. The nightmare had taken away so much of my strength, and right now, being with Logan, feeling him so close, I wanted to completely turn off. The need to be in his arms again was burning me up, consuming all of me, and I didn’t give a damn.
“Logan,” I said. My voice was little more than a whisper.
He groaned and pulled back.
I felt him leave, and it hurt. My body actually ached, but I caught myself and held firm.
He laughed, his voice shaky. “I was two seconds from taking you here.”
“I was two seconds from letting you.”
He turned and shook his head. “I didn’t come over to your house for a sex marathon, I swear. But I’ve got a feeling that’s where we’re going.” It was where we always went.
His eyes darkened, skimming over my face and falling to my lips once again. A guttural groan left him.
“Why did you?”
“What?” He met my eyes again.
“Why did you come over?”
“Oh.” Somehow, the heat cooled. My question put a damper on him. I tried telling myself that was for the best.
I tried…
He cleared his throat, glancing back to the roller coaster. “Honestly? I came to make sure you were okay. You didn’t respond to my messages.”
“Oh, yeah.” The nightmare. I shoved that away.
“But you slept late.” His eyes narrowed, seeing through me again. “Right?”
I nodded. I had. That was the truth. I just didn’t tell him the reason why. I’d already slipped too much, though I’d begun to feel I could say anything to Logan. The thought of letting it out, talking about it for the first time without being forced, had my throat swelling with emotion. Did I even want to talk about it? It had been locked away for almost a year. My dad had read the report. He knew what had happened, but we hadn’t discussed it. Claire. Jason. They didn’t know.
Unless they talked to Eric, a voice said in my head.
Eric.
Everything went flat inside of me. The heat simmering and brewing in me from Logan went cold—as if a pot of water had been poured on it. I was left with bitter smoke instead. It filled my mouth with a sour taste.
“We’re going in there?” A car sat on the track, its door open and waiting for the next passenger.
“No, no.” Logan caught my hand before I could touch the car to get in. He pointed to a narrow walkway alongside the track. “We’re going up there.”
“Up there?” The roller coaster wound in circles, and the tallest point was the highest place in the entire park. “I thought we were just going to sit in the car or something. What about a plain boring warehouse? Or haunted house? Up there looks dangerous. Does that work? Is that safe?”
“It doesn’t, but my dad had a crew come out here. It’s safe to walk on. He can’t get sued, even if there are no trespassing signs.” He pointed to one pinned on the animal barn behind us. I could hear the chuckle in his voice. “You never know what idiots might come out here, scoping to see if they could throw a party.”
I turned back to him. “Is that why you come here?”
He hopped down onto the path and held his hands up for me. I went to him, and his hands rested on my hips as he lifted me and placed me on the path behind him.
“Yeah, the first time,” he said with a nod. “Then I realized the place is too big, too dangerous for a party.”
I didn’t want his hands to leave. “And since then?”
They did, but then his hand found mine. It fit perfectly. “And since then, it’s just for me. I rigged something up here. I don’t come here often, but sometimes I do when I want to be alone. Don’t start thinking I’m a pansy. It’s a new place for me. Trust me, my usual place to go think is the bar, but I don’t know. You can see all of Cain up there. A warehouse is easy to find, but not this. Come on.” He started forward. “I want to show you something.”
BUCKET LIST
#SEXONAROLLERCOASTER
TAYLOR
We were in another world.
That was what it felt like as we climbed to the highest part of the roller coaster. I refused to look down, and thankfully the path didn’t loop-the-loop when the tracks did. My stomach couldn’t have handled that. Once we reached the top, I saw what Logan was talking about. A solitary car sat at the crest of the biggest drop. It was clean and shiny. Logan’s must’ve wiped it down. When he opened the door so I could climb inside, I saw a blanket folded neatly in the back of the two-seater.
“Nuh-uh.”
“What?”
I pointed at the car. “I’m not getting in that thing. We’ll die.”
He laughed and shook the car. It rattled against the track, but it didn’t move. He shook it a little ha
rder, and it still didn’t go anywhere. “I rolled it up here and bolted it down. This baby won’t go anywhere, and it can’t come off the track. Only way it’ll fall is if the track goes with it. It’s safe. I promise.”
My stomach had been clenched in knots the whole trek up here. They weren’t going away, and we still had to get down. “Logan, I don’t know.”
“Come on.” He patted the car. His tone gentled. “Please?”
“Did you bring me up here to kill me?” I plastered myself against the railing.
“I brought you up for a reason, but that’s not it.”
“You rolled this car all the way up here?”
“Yeah.”
I took a step forward, then thought better of it. I pointed at him. “You go first.”
He frowned, but hopped in. The way he moved, so lithe and agile, I gasped. My stomach leaped, and I reached for him. It was reflex, but I swear, I thought he was going over. “Logan!” My heart pounded, fast and furious.
“I’m good.” He patted the seat next to him. “You afraid of heights?”
I groaned, inching into the car. Then I was torn. To close the car door or not? Should I keep easy access to the walking path and railing, or feel more secure? I took a deep breath. My fingers clenched around the door, but I shut it. Once it clicked in place, I needed a minute. I forced myself to keep breathing. Even breaths. In and out. In and out, and when the car didn’t fall or move, I started to feel a bit more secure. Just a bit.
Logan watched me. “Guess that answers my question.”
“You’re crazy.”
“I’ve been told that.”
I shook my head, but his eyes were warm, looking at me, and his dimples showed—I was already forgetting where we were. I was with him. That was at the forefront of my mind. All else was stripped away. That was the power Logan Kade had over me, and it grew stronger with each minute we spent together.
I let out a soft sigh and felt the world right itself again. I was no longer scared.
“Better?”
“Better.”
His grin widened. I caught a twinkle of something mischievous in him and only had a second to brace myself before he twisted around to reach behind the seat.
I grabbed for the bar in front of us and clutched it.
Logan laughed as he pulled the blanket from the back. He unfolded it and shook it out over his side of the car. Then he turned back to me and pulled it over our laps. The evening had started to fade, and so had the temperature. I hadn’t noticed the cool breeze until now, but once the blanket hit my lap, it warmed my legs.
“Okay. This is nice,” I told him.
“Good.” Logan pointed out in front of us. “This is why I brought you up here. Look.”
Then everything made sense—why he’d taken the time and effort to bring the car here, why we’d climbed all this way: the view. As I lifted my head and looked beyond us, I saw my hometown looking beautiful, serene, the way it used to be to me. I gestured to the town laid out in front of us. “This is beautiful. Thank you, Logan.” I looked at him now. “I mean it. Thank you. I’d forgotten that my home could be beautiful.”
Logan grew quiet, but it didn’t matter. For some reason, the words were coming to me now, and I didn’t want to stop them.
“My mom died last year, and since then, I’ve forgotten about things. I forgot about views like this.” I pointed to the hospital. It was the tallest building, set on the outskirts of town. “She died there.”
Bang! Bang!
I flinched, my hand closing again around the bar in front of me. I could hear the shots again. “I was coming home for the holidays. I finished my finals a week earlier. I got lucky somehow. Eric, my boyfriend, wasn’t done. He wanted to stay and study all weekend, but I talked him into going home with me. I promised I’d help him study, so he agreed. I knew my mom was working a double—she was a nurse—so I talked him into stopping at the hospital on the way into town…” I faltered, remembering the day once again.
Going inside the hospital.
Going past the front desk.
Turning down the hallway to the nurses’ station—then the first gunshot.
“My mom was in the ER that night. She loved working there. She loved the adrenaline, the excitement, but that night...” My chest felt like it was shrinking. I was moving backward even though I sat still. “I was told later that a man came in with a gunshot wound. He was still alive.”
Feeling panic, I started to run down the hallway—boom.
“In the chaos, another man walked back there and shot him. He wanted to finish what he’d started. After the first gunshot, it was quiet. Eric and I were walking down the hallway to the nurses’ station, but everyone stopped. Then the second gunshot sounded, and everyone started running. A big guy turned and slammed into me. Apparently, I still wasn’t out of his way enough because he kicked me then, and I fell to the floor. It was funny because I couldn’t feel any pain, but I knew it must’ve hurt because I couldn’t walk.”
Bang!
“The gunman turned the gun on my mom. He shot her twice, and he killed the doctor in there, too. Then he started shooting everyone in the hallway.”
“Taylor, come on!” Eric grabbed my hand and started to pull.
“Eric tried to drag me backward.”
“No. My mom.”
“Taylor, come on!”
“No.” I looked back to the nurses’ station. No one was there. “She’s back there. I have to find her.”
“He wanted to run, but I could only think about my mom. She was back there somewhere.”
“Taylor,” Logan said.
I shook my head. I heard the sympathy in his voice, and I knew he was going to say all the right things: I didn’t have to talk. I didn’t have to share. I didn’t have to fill-in-the-blank. He was wrong. I did have to. I had to get it out now or I never would.
“It didn’t matter anyway,” I continued. “Even if Eric had tried to drag me out, I couldn’t move. The big guy had fucked my knee up bad. And then…” The fourth gunshot. It had sounded right around the corner. “The gunman was coming toward us. We could hear him.”
I heard the screams again.
“Eric left me there.” I flinched. “There were bathrooms across from us; we could’ve gone in there. It didn’t matter, though. Eric left. He ran while I was pleading for him to help me.”
“What happened to the gunman?”
“A cop got him. They’re always called when there’s a GSW. They just didn’t get there in time. They came in through the emergency entrance, so they were behind him. He was leaving, you see. He had just come around the corner to the hallway where I was when they shot him.”
“This happened at Cain Memorial?”
I nodded. “The whole thing was kept quiet by the cops. The gunman was involved in another shooting so there wasn’t any media coverage. The media respected their wishes.”
“I had no idea that happened last year.”
“A lot of people still don’t know all the details, and now the hospital has better security. I think they have metal detectors.”
“Taylor.”
Logan’s voice was so soft. “I’m not telling you for sympathy,”