Okay then. I stayed where I was, noting that at some point in the night, he’d pinched my boots, put my dick away, and tucked me up in the sleeping bag.
I shifted, making room for him. “You rest, I rest.”
He made me drink the coffee first. Then Viktor lay down beside me. His skin was cold, letting me know he’d been outside, and the habit I’d developed post-concussion of sleeping like I’d died was still alive and kicking.
I didn’t hear him.
Unsurprising, considering the life he’d lived before he’d made mine worth living, but I still fucking hated it.
“Why does your heart beat so fast?”
I pulled Vik on top of me, knocking away the fingers he’d plumbed into the pulse point at my throat. “You excite me.”
He offered no challenge. Just chuckled as I fucked around with the sleeping bag, trying to warm him up, his head on my chest, arms around me, legs tangled with mine. Quieter still as his breathing evened out, not sleeping, but close, his grip on me looser with every pass of my fingers through his hair, shorter since he’d asked Orla to cut it.
I let my thoughts wander, contemplating the drop we had to make today before we finally went home, a pull that remained, even with Viktor in my arms.
Lida.
Jean.
The hours of driving until I saw them again that were nothing beside the miles we’d already put in, but maybe that was the Vik effect?—
Bang!
Something hit the window.
I bolted upright, a sharp gasp hitting my fucking lungs. Fight or flight could get fucked, I was a hundred percentfightall the way, and I surged from the bed, already making to pull Viktor behind me.
He resisted, eyes blinking open like a sunbathing cat. “Asher, stop. Is just Rubi waking up.”
“How the fuck do you know?” I scrambled from beneath him anyway, my feet hitting the floor as something else hit the window. A protein shake that splattered the glass, white gunk eroding the view. “Never mind.”
I hopped into the front of the cab and exited through the driver door, rounding the front of the HGV in time for Rubi to sling another bottle, and you know what? Fuck that. The Rattler was a heap of crap, but she’d done me proud so far, apart from the fucking tyre. If Rubi wanted to throw camel jizz at something, he could throw it at me. “Stop being a crazy cunt.”
Rubi whirled around. “You.”
“Me what?”
“You swapped my protein shakes.”
My brain turned itself inside out trying to make sense of that bullshit. “Swapped them for what?”
“Fuckinggoat’smilk. My mouth tastes like Philoctetes took a shit in it.”
I’d jumped out of bed ready to take down an army, but I was definitely not awake enough to have a fucking clue what he was talking about. Didn’t even have the words to say so. I just stared, waiting for his ranting to make sense.
Didn’t happen.
Rubi pulled his arm back to chuck the bottle at me, but Viktor had it out of his hand so fast Rubi jumped out of his skin. “Did you just fucking teleport?”
Viktor laughed, but thoughhe’ddone far worse to me than flick tarted-up milkshake in my face, his stance had enough edge that Rubi cocked a brow and folded his arms across his chest.
“Like that, is it, Vicky?”
Viktor shrugged, launching the bottle into a nearby bin. Oh cute. He was protecting me. FromRubi. As if the eight seconds I’d been out of bed could be any more fucked up.
A web of tension filled the air. Rubi had this way of being aggressive without losing the laughter in his eyes. And Vik? He was more lethal than most people—even me—would ever know. Rubi was massive, but in a real fight against Viktor, he didn’t stand a chance. Which meant River would fight too—which meantI’dhave to fight River, and... yeah. Fuck that. “I didn’t touch your gorilla shakes.”