Opening the back door, I got snarls from both the Cage siblings. “What the fuck, Luca?” Shaw snapped at me. “What the hell did you do to her? She came out, begging us to take her home, crying so hard I could barely understand her.”
I didn’t have time to explain to her, and even if I did, I wouldn’t have. She didn’t matter. Only Violet. Only ever Vi.
Reaching in, I unbuckled her seat belt and then lifted my girl into my arms. I didn’t have time to see her face as I tossed her over my shoulder and made a run for it to my SUV before anyone tried to stop me. But I heard her sobs, and my knees went weak at the sound. Her fists pounded on my back as I carried her, the only thing keeping me upright was the certainty that I couldn’t drop her.
“Put me down!” she raged. “Luca, you asshole. Put. Me. Down!” She started kicking her legs, and I tightened my arms around the back of her knees to lock her in place.
My keys were in my gym bag, but I didn’t need to get them out as I unlocked the door with my thumb and placed her in the front passenger seat. Once she was in place, I secured her with the seat belt, and only then did I look at her face.
I hated the sight of those beautiful purple eyes filled with tears. They gutted me. She should only ever smile, and I couldn’t stand that I was the cause of her pain. I cupped her face in both of my hands, wiping away her tears with my thumbs as I swallowed the lump in my throat. “She jumped me,” I explained. “She came out of nowhere and took me by surprise.”
“You outweigh her by at least a hundred and fifty pounds, Luca,” she snipped. “Are you honestly going to tell me you couldn’t manage a girl that size who supposedly attacked you with her lips?”
“Not supposedly, Vi. It’s the truth. Ask your dad, he saw everything. Come on, babe. Don’t be mad at me. I didn’t do anything wrong.” I leaned in, kissing her forehead, but she shoved me back.
“She stole it,” Violet sobbed, burying her face in her hands.
I pulled her hands away from her face, my heart pounding. “Stole what, baby?”
“Your first kiss!” she yelled, but it was the utter heartbreak on her beautiful face that nearly had me falling at her feet. “It was supposed to be mine, and she stole it. And you let her.”
“No,” I denied vehemently. “That doesn’t count.”
“She had her tongue in your mouth—of course, it counts.” She tried to shove me back again, but I refused to move. She was not leaving me while she was pissed. “Let me go, Luca. I’m done talking to you. You just did the one thing I never thought you were actually capable of doing. You hurt me, and I can’t even breathe right now.”
“No, no,” I whispered, holding on to her hands like she was the only thing anchoring me to this world. “Baby, I’m sorry. I… I don’t…” I didn’t know how to fix this. I could see how much pain she was in, and it only made me hurt too.
“You let her kiss you,” she cried, and her heartbreak was my own. “You let her put her lips on you and—”
I couldn’t take it a second longer. I was in absolute agony, and the only thing I could think of to stop it was to kiss her.
My lips caught hers, cutting off her words, and I finally got my first real taste of Violet. She tasted sweet and pure, like every good thing in the universe rolled into one small package. It was heaven and hell, and I nearly sobbed at how fucking perfect it was.
She went still for a moment, and I was scared she was going to push me away. Instead, she clenched her fingers in my shirt and pulled me closer. She moaned, and I felt the vibration of that small sound all the way to my bones. Fuck, I’d never been so hard in my life, and I tangled my hands in her hair, deepening the kiss until I had no choice but to come up for air.
When I lifted my head, we were both breathing heavily, and I pressed my forehead to hers. “I’m sorry,” I murmured again. “I’m so damn sorry. Please forgive me.”
“I…” She let out a small, content sigh. “What were we talking about?”
I lifted my head to look down at her. Her eyes were glazed with desire, and her mouth was swollen and red. I touched her plump bottom lip, aching to kiss her again, but I knew if I did, I wouldn’t be able to stop. Fuck, I was surprised I’d been able to the first time.
“I love you. I only want you. Believe that, if nothing else. You are my future, my life, my everything. Don’t let some dumb bitch come between us.” I pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Please, babe.”
“O-okay,” she breathed, hugging me against her. “But don’t let her or anyone else kiss you again.”
“I swear. My lips, my body, all of me belongs to only you.”
“The magic of first love is our ignorance that it can never end.”
~ Benjamin Disraeli
Chapter 6
Luca
“Dude, this birthday royally sucks,” Lyric grumbled as he slammed his locker shut and glared at me. “We’re eighteen today, and no one even seems to care. Mom and Dad didn’t even wake us up with a cake and singing ‘Happy Birthday’ like they always do. There were no birthday pancakes, and when I called Lucy earlier, she didn’t even wish me happy birthday.”
I was barely paying him any attention as I stared at my phone, mentally demanding a text from Violet to show up. Every year since she’d first gotten a cell phone, she’d texted me at exactly midnight on my birthday so she could be the first one to wish me happy birthday. Before she’d been given a phone, she would sneak the cordless landline phone into her bed and call me.
But there had been no text at midnight, and now it was noon, and still nothing. It was like she forgot.
“Everyone forgot our birthday,” Lyric whined. “You would think they would all be relieved we made it to adulthood without getting arrested or anyone pregnant.”
I grunted, continuing to give myself a headache as I willed a message to appear.
Lyric had been looking forward to us turning eighteen, but I’d been dreading it. Eighteen meant I was legal, but Violet wasn’t. If I slipped up and touched her in every way I ached to now, I would be breaking so damn many laws. Normally, I wouldn’t even hesitate to break the rules, but not when it came to my girl. I wasn’t going to do anything to fuck us up—or give her dad a reason to not let me see her.
When my phone suddenly rang, I thought my head was going to explode, but when I saw the name on the screen, I bit back a curse. “Hey, Mia,” I muttered as I answered.
“Happy birthday!” she said cheerfully.
“Yeah, thanks.”
“Uh oh. Someone is grumpy. What’s wrong, little cousin? Didn’t get what you wanted for your birthday?”
As she spoke, Lyric’s phone went off, and he picked it up. “Nev!”
“Happy birthday!” I heard our cousin yell at the top of her lungs. But she and Mia must have both been home and not in class since I heard it echo through my phone.
“At least someone remembered,” Lyric said loudly.
“Oh no,” Mia said in my ear, having heard him. “Sounds like you are both grumpy. What’s wrong with you two?”