Into the Light (University of Isles #2)

26. Chapter 26

Chapter twenty-six

For the past month, we had spent every single night together, but it didn’t have a label. I was okay with it just being . . . us. The thought of having to put a name on whatever we were, terrified me.

During those nights, we talked about Ash, sharing happy memories of him. Neither of us felt shame or constant anxiety about the life we were living and the memories we held of him. It felt . . . good. Almost too good to be true.

Just as I was getting ready to make us dinner, his familiar Doc Martins thudded against the floor, followed by the click of the key in the doorknob. I took a seat on the couch and gazed out at the distant pines.

“Come on, Ember,” he said, storming over to me. “Get up. We’re leaving.”

I quickly stood up, feeling a rush of questions. “Why? Where are we going?” I demanded, but he only scoffed and started gathering sweaters from my room, stuffing them into a duffle bag he found under my bed.

“Stop,” I cried, closing the gap between us and grabbing his trembling hands. “What happened?”

My words tumbled out faster, driven by my desire for the truth, something I loved about Rain. “I had a terrible meeting,” he lamented as my hands moved to cradle his face. “Please, don’t ask me questions, Ember.”

I swallowed my curiosity, rare in our relationship, because I could see he needed this.

“Okay,” I whispered, and reached up to give him a small kiss on the cheek. Something for him to carry with him, knowing the burden he carried on his back was strong. Because he always spoke the truth, I would not push him.

He sighed and collapsed on the bed.

“I went to see your brother,” he said as he stared up at the wall. It took a moment for those words to actually register with me.

“My brother?”

“Yeah,” he replied blankly.

“What? Why?” I questioned for the second time in the five minutes he’d been home.

He sighed before pushing off the bed and holding my hands in his.

“I feel so much pressure for what’s going to happen next. I am supposed to graduate this summer, go to Dansport, and start doing business dealings for the Cartel, for Mr. Ortiz. The last thing I want to do is that. I want to write . . . damn it.” He exhaled a large breath. “I want to live in our country house . . . together.”

“I don’t graduate for another year,” I whispered.

“I know. I want to stay here in Isles with you until you’re ready to come with me, or go wherever you want to.” He paused and then his fingers slid so they were cusping my chin. “I’d do whatever you want, Ember, because I cannot imagine a world without waking up to your smile everyday.”

My heart started to race so fast it felt like it was going to practically jump-scare out of my chest. “Rain?” I could barely whisper his name aloud, but his fingers caressed my face as if he knew exactly what I wanted to say but the words weren’t quite there yet. As if he understood the pause between us was more intimate than the eight little letters could ever combine.

“Wait,” I snapped out of my daydream. “What does this have to do with my brother?”

“Well, Pico was there, too.”

“Okay, and that answers absolutely nothing.” I crossed my arms and rested so I was between his legs.

“It does though, mi pareja.” His fingers were still trailing down my cheek and gently tucking my hair behind my ear. “I needed Pico and Walsh to get along and finally have a sit-down to end this war between our families. Pico is going to take over for me. He agreed.”

“What?” I balked.

“Yeah. He’s a born leader. He enjoys fucking around with people, and everyone respects him. I just need to find a way to sit down with your dad and Mr. Ortiz together. As soon as I piece together the evidence I need as to what happened last year with Ash.”

“I can help.” I stood up taller.

“Of course you can,” he responded. “This was, after all, your idea.”

My brows furrowed, not understanding what he meant.

“You told Ash when you first met him that words were a more powerful tool than running around with guns and hating each other.” I laughed.

“He told you this?” Rain smiled as he remembered.

“He told me he’d thought it was the silliest thing he’d heard. Because what was more powerful than words? Words were just something that came out of your mouth, but brute strength was obviously something bigger and better.”

He chuckled as if he was remembering the conversation. “But damn, Ember, did you prove him wrong.”

I gave a breathless huff. “I did, didn’t I?”

His lips came crashing down to mine while he whispered, “You absolutely did.”

“Wait,” I pulled away. “So, what did Walsh say?”

“He agreed to it, but then Pico went outside to wait for me, and Walsh essentially did the same run around he gave you except this time he acknowledged that he was there when Ash died, but that he cannot say anything other than that.”

Of course he couldn’t. “I don’t fucking get it. He was never like this. Why was he keeping a secret that wasn’t even his to keep?”

“I don’t know, princesa.” He sighed, clearly frustrated, and I decided not to press because it was obviously agitating him.

“Anyway, he said that the answer is in front of us like he was delivering some words of wisdom or something, but anyway, you can see why the whole meeting really just irked me.” He grabbed my waist and pulled me tighter into him as his head nuzzled into my neck.

“Mmm, I am sorry for taking it all out on you. I just want to go away for the night.”

My ears perked up. “Oh, yeah?”

“Come on, Em,” he whispered as his lips came across mine. “Help me erase my day.”

My lips were dancing atop his. “Okay.”

I pulled away from him and grabbed a few extra sweaters and jeans, knowing where we were going without him even saying.

“Let’s go,” I whispered as I interlaced my hand in his. I looked up just as we walked out toward his bike and could have sworn I saw a little star above dancing in the night sky.

Hi Ash and Sol.

I glanced back at Rain on his bike handing me my helmet as he looked at what I was staring at.

“Are you ready?” he asked, and I looked at the man standing before me.

“Yes.” I got on the back of the bike and wrapped my arms around his waist. He caressed my arms before he started the engine and peeled out.

When we got off the ATV and pulled up to the familiar cabin, I went inside because it was far colder in the middle of the pines than back in town.

“It’s freezing,” I exclaimed, and Rain laughed as we were welcomed by the warmth of the cabin. But there was something . . . red?

I looked around the cabin and realized it was blanketed in red rose petals around the bed.

“Did you—”

“What the—”

We both said at the same time and then a sly grin raised on both of our faces.

“Pico.”

“Marissa,” I told him, and he agreed. I walked over to the kitchen where there was a bottle of champagne, my favorite seltzers, and already popped popcorn because this place did not have a microwave.

“Netflix and chill?” he asked, and I giggled, feeling a little out of place in the cabin because the last time we’d been here it was so hard for Rain to look me in the eyes. Almost as if he could read my mind, he walked up toward me and brushed a hair behind my ear.

“It’s different this time,” he murmured.

“It is.” I agreed. “Also, this is a little too cheesy for me.”

This time he burst into laughter that rang like a melody throughout the room.

“I couldn’t agree with you more.” His lips were on mine, and I was fucking starving for his kiss. I wanted to fuck his pain away. I wanted to take away the pressure that brewed deep within me from my head to my core.

“Let’s make a mess of it, then, shall we?” he asked.

“Is this why you brought me here?” I rasped, a small chuckle escaping my lips.

“Maybe?” A mischievous glint twinkled in his eye, which only made me drown into his deep blues.

“Show me what you got, then.” I winked, and he closed the gap between us.

“You want me?” he growled into my ear, and I let out a moan, not able to contain it. “Good.”

His voice was so harsh and raspy that I barely recognized it. “Play a little game with me, princesa?” I nodded as his lips pressed into the delicate skin on my neck.

“I want you to do what you do best.” I paused, pulling away slightly to catch the glint of desire pooling in his eyes.

I knew what he wanted me to do. I looked around the room for my shoes, but he let out a symphony of groans as his mouth came back down onto my neck, and in this moment, I didn’t care I was about to run out there without them.

Because I wasn’t scared of the darkness anymore; I’d found my light.

I yanked away from him and glanced toward the door before running as fast as I could out of it. I swore I could hear him laughing as I triumphantly continued trekking deeper into the woods.

It was freezing as I unpeeled my jeans, leaving them in my trail and dodging behind the large trunks of the trees. I was breathless as the oxygen left my lungs with every pound of my feet against the cold, wet floor underneath me.

“Sal, sal, de dónde quiera que estés, princesa.” I heard him whisper through the pines, knowing he was right on me as I slowly moved to the next big tree trunk and hunched underneath it.

There was mud everywhere, which was truthfully my only saving grace because it meant my footsteps were somewhat muted in the otherwise eerily quiet forest.

“Such a little mouse today,” he growled, and by the way his voice echoed, I could tell he was closer.

I frantically looked around, but the thick pines covered most of the moonlight from the night.

“Shit,” I muttered under my breath before I walked forward, crunching on the earth below me as I went. I was being so loud, there was no way he—

“Fuck,” I screamed when two big arms wrapped around me and lifted me off the prickly ground, then he threw me over his shoulder and slapped me on my ass. He was my predator and I was his prey.

I yelled and thrashed, frustrated that I couldn’t break free from his grip. Yet, as he hoisted me over his shoulders, I couldn’t ignore the palpable sexual tension between us, intensifying the chilly atmosphere. When he tossed me onto the soft, muddy ground, I found myself melting into him, disregarding the dirt now covering us.

His mouth captured mine as I responded, my entire body succumbing to him. I was ravenous for him, never remembering how starved for a human I’d ever been like. We’d built our relationship on such a solid foundation that the trust that I’d managed to have for him was more than I’d ever experienced, and that scared me.

“I . . . need . . . you,” I croaked out as our tongues clashed against each other in a frenzied demand.

“You have me” was all he responded with, his hands pulling at my lace panties, tugging them aside to fit his fingers into my soaking wet core.

My back rolled against the earthen floor beneath me as I writhed with each thrust his fingers made.

“Mmmm,” I murmured as his thumb touched my clit and his other fingers fucked me. By the way he dominated me, he knew he was mine too. My ray of light in the life that was so full of sadness and despair. He was it for me.

As if suddenly I’d had an epiphany, my body responded to his touch in a way it’d never had before. I was needier—more desperate, if that could have even occurred.

“You are so wet for me,” he mused. His eyes stayed fixated onto mine the entire time as his fingers continued to assault me.

“I need . . .” I froze.

“Tell me,” he groaned into my mouth before pressing his lips onto mine. I was fucking drenched in mud, especially with how much I’d been moving beneath him, and all I could do was beg for his fucking cock inside my needy little cunt.

“Fuck me, Rain.”

My sweater had ridden up so the bottom of my breasts were peeking out.

“So fucking beautiful,” he murmured, his jaw clenched as he drank me in. “Like my little prey that I get to devour.”

The sound of his pants being unzipped was the only forewarning he gave me before his cock sprung free from his boxer briefs.

“I love how wet your cunt responds when I come close, like it knows who is its home,” he mused as the tip of his pre-cum cock touched my opening.

“I love how fucking dirty you look after I chased you around the forest like the fucking little minx that you are.” He pushed inside of me. I was in a state of complete bliss. My brain floating above my body until his voice brought me back to reality. The pure raw and feral fucking between us as I locked my ankles behind his back. He was ramming into me the pressure building at my core, and I was at the edge of a release. I needed him so desperately inside of me—to feel his warmth collide with my own.

“Please,” I begged. I was so fucking close as his hands gripped my neck, adding a little pressure.

Suddenly, my breath slowed as he pressed down, not painfully, but just enough to make sure that my orgasm slowed slightly as his muddy hands slid around my sweater and my stomach.

“Tell me who is yours.” His voice was thick with pleasure as he demanded more from me.

“Y-you.” He released my neck enough for me to respond before he added a little more pressure, cutting off the air from coming in.

“Not good enough,” he commanded. “Who, Ember?”

“Rain,” I cried out, and then he released my neck as the rush of pleasure exploded through my core.

“Rain . . . Rain . . . Rain,” I repeated as I writhed beneath him, letting the release roll through my core and sending a shiver down my spine.

I collapsed on the cool mud, suddenly remembering we were in the woods. I was hesitant only because I was worried the wave of shame would creep back into my life, but it didn’t happen.

Rain lifted himself up, covered in a mess of mud, leaves, and tree bark. I burst into laughter. It wasn’t even the cute, giggly type of laugh either, no, it came from deep within me from a joy hard to describe.

“Come on, princesa.” He offered me a hand, and as I sat up and looked at it, I couldn’t help but plaster a smile on my face.

“Rain?” I questioned.

“Yeah?”

“Can we grow old and still chase each other in the woods like this?” His fingers shook as he still held his hand out toward mine.

I knew my words held a deeper and heavier meaning. They implied I wanted to be with him forever. Aside from the house in the countryside I’d signed for, neither of us spoke of a future outside of Isles. It scared both of us to live in a future where he and I could exist together.

Because sometimes it was beautiful to dream and romanticize what your life could look like. I wanted to curl up by the fireplace and escape to faraway cities and talk about what our future would and could look like with him. I wanted to exist in the present, future, and even in the past. Because I never wanted us to lose the love we shared for Ash, either.

“It would be my honor,” he finally whispered after a long pause. I grabbed his hand as he lifted me up.

“Let’s go home?” he asked, and I nodded, then we ran together through the forest. In my mind, it felt like we were simply frolicking in a field, but we were naked from the bottom down, covered head to toe in mud.

Rain grabbed my jeans on the way back to the cabin where we exploded through the door into a fit of giggles as he guided me into the small bathroom.

He turned on the shower as hot as it could get, and we both tumbled in. The grass, leaves, mud fell into the tub as he rubbed soap onto my body. We were both silent, but his hands never left my body. They continued to wash and clean me.

“Do you feel better?” I asked after the silence became too deafening.

“From fucking you?” He asked and I giggled.

“No.” I reached my now clean hands up to his face to wash a streak of dirt. “This is the first time we are here after what happened last time.”

“My panic attack?”

“Yeah,” I responded.

“I started to see a therapist.”

“You did?” I asked in shock.

“Fuck yeah. After you told me you did and felt better after, why not? I have a lot of shit to work through. Obviously, I cannot tell her everything, but it feels nice to have a time set aside to talk about all of this.”

“And it helped with your . . . panic attacks?” I asked as the warm water kept trickling down my back and he worked meticulously to wash me with the little bar of soap.

“Yeah, I think I just realized that you are your own person, you know?”

“No, I don’t,” I answered honestly.

He looked down, washing me but not looking up, as it seemed like he was trying to come up with the right words.

“I just always assumed it was Ash and Ember. Without Ash here, you were still Ash and Ember in my mind, and I needed to separate the two of you. Like you could exist with him, but you also weren’t with him anymore,” he explained, pausing. “It’s selfish of me, but I don’t know if there was anyone else other than you. I sacrificed for him to protect him, but in my heart, I watched the one person I felt an immediate connection with fall for my brother, and it was so damn hard.”

“Rain,” I offered empathetically, trying to ease his inner turmoil.

He pushed my hand away and stepped back in the shower. Both of us stood under the water as I blinked rapidly. “It’s okay, Ember,” he continued. “I think that’s what I needed to know. It’s okay that you were his. I’m glad he got to know what it felt like to love you.”

His voice choked up as he continued, “Because loving you has been the best thing to ever happen to me. If he even felt a fraction of what I feel right now, he’s an incredibly lucky man. Loving you has been the greatest honor of my life.”

I knew he was crying now, even through the droplets of water from the shower. “Rain, I think I—”

He brought his fingers to my lips again, stopping me from speaking. “No,” he said silently, his voice raspy, and he washed the soap off me in silence.

“Turn around,” he whispered, and I obliged, his hands trailing down my body.

Once he finished, he turned off the water, handed me a towel, and gave me one of his oversized t-shirts. He helped me put it on, guiding one arm through, then my neck, and the other arm.

It was a slow, familiar routine we’d established over the last month of being together. “I don’t want anyone else,” I whispered, tears flowing freely. “Please, be mine,” I pleaded as I turned toward him.

I was in his cabin, standing there in only his T-shirt. He was toweling off his hair lazily while putting on my favorite pair of gray sweats, which for some inexplicable reason, made him look incredibly attractive.

We walked out of the tiny bathroom and headed toward the bed in the center of the room. “Get in, mi pareja,” he said, lifting the covers after he’d jumped onto the bed. I slid in next to him as he wrapped me up into a warm cocoon.

After a few minutes of silence, with only the sounds of the forest filling the cabin, I shifted so I was facing him. “Rain?” I asked for the third time today.

“Mmm?” he murmured. His eyes heavy with sleep.

“I love you,” I blurted, not wanting him to stop me from saying it. I knew it wasn’t technically the first time I’d confessed that I was in love with him because I had said it in class, but I’d never said it to his face.

“Em—” This time, it was my turn to stop him with my finger.

“I love you, Rain. I know you weren’t always there for me, but you were. You were always there in your own way before we learned to love ourselves. When I was with Ash, our love felt so frantic and consuming.” He gulped.

“I loved it because I needed it to learn that life wasn’t about living in this closed-off world that I had been forced into my entire life.” I smiled, thinking of falling in love with Ash and the beautiful memories we shared. “I loved him so much, Rain. But I also knew that falling in love with you would be different, which is maybe why I kept the door shut for so long. Your love scared me because it didn’t consume me in the same way.”

“I’m sorry—”

“No,” I interrupted him. “I’m not saying that to upset you. Quite the contrary. That all-or-nothing type of love isn’t sustainable for a long period of time. I can’t tell you that I wouldn’t be with him right now, but I also know that being with you feels safe, protective, supportive. You aren’t the villain in this story; you’re my hero, my savior. You brought me back from the dead.”

“I’d crawl from hell to come back to you,” he whispered.

“But you’d never be there. You’d be in heaven playing with Ash and Sol,” I said, my chest constricting at the thought of them. “Loving you is like being wrapped in one of your hugs. It’s warm, safe, and comforting. It gives me a steady surface when I still feel wobbly on my knees.”

“Ember?” I looked up through blurred vision.

“Yeah?”

“I love you, too.”

Our lips met in a frenzied kiss. As I sank deeper into Rain’s arms, I realized that everything would be okay.

Into the light I’ll be.