Page 25 of No Sweeter Poison

“Is this okay?”

“Too okay. I’m going to finish before I’m even inside you.”

I almost laugh but he kisses me again, scattering my thoughts.

I can hardly see anything in the darkness but my legs hit something solid and he guides me down onto the bed where my back meets thick blankets and fluffy pillows. He’s about to pull my skirt down when this awful, grating noise cuts through the lusty haze.

My fucking phone.

“Where…?”

I sit up and fish it out of my skirt pocket. “I’ll turn it off.”

The phone stops ringing and I toss it somewhere in the darkness. I wrap my legs around his waist and his hands travel to the back of my bra—

It rings again. It keeps ringing until I scramble in the dark to find it.

“This cannot be happening…”

“Answer it.”

I turn around and Alejandro’s kneeling on the edge of the bed, cheeks flushed with heat, voice rough. When he speaks, his voice travels right between my legs. “It could be important.”

On cue, it rings again, and Karina’s name blinks to life on the screen. I answer the call.

“Somebody better be fucking dying.”

T he ride back to Barcelona is as awkward as it is quiet.

When I can’t take the silence anymore, I turn in my seat and say, “I’m really sorry—”

Alejandro gives a firm shake of the head. “Don’t be. I’m glad you answered.”

I’m not. In fact, I really think this could’ve waited till morning.

He sighs a bit. “So, Karina’s going home?”

The whole thing seems ridiculous to me.

Apparently, Brent has it in his head that Karina cheated on him during our trip because of one picture on Instagram. When we went on the boat ride with Alejandro and his siblings a few days ago, Karina got seasick. I must not have noticed when I took a photo of the sunset because I’m not a psycho like Brent, but if you zoom in closely, you can see Diego and Karina. Diego has his arms around her while she has her head lowered in his direction. What the camera can’t see is the paper bag in her hand.

She got dizzy and almost fell. Even puked on his shoes, poor thing. That’s why he was holding onto her. She even looks sick in the photo but couple her “compromising” position with the fact that she hasn’t been answering some of his calls the last week, he came to his own conclusions.

He called her an hour ago, they got into a fight, and now he’s threatening to cancel the wedding. Obviously, I need to talk her down from jumping on the first flight back to New York. We’re supposed to be going to Italy in three days for the next part of our trip and I feel like Brent is doing it on purpose. In a few days, he’ll forget they were even arguing but it won’t matter because our trip will have been ruined.

“Not if I have anything to say about it.” I grumble. “Brent’s such a prick sometimes. The photo was completely innocent and he’s blowing everything out of proportion.”

“Has he always…?”

He never finishes his sentence.

We’re all alone on the highway until a light up ahead momentarily blinds us. When it’s clear the car is heading straight into our lane, Alejandro jerks the wheel to the left, narrowly dodging the hit, when we get rammed from behind.

I barely have time to scream before we’re hit a second time. An SUV crashes into our left side and glass shatters and explodes, and as we spin in tight, sharp circles, Alejandro’s arm slams against my chest, keeping me from flying into the dashboard. We’re hit a third time, the black car coming out of nowhere as it hits my side, and the airbags deploy. Alejandro hits the breaks and we crash into a road barrier.

My ears are ringing. The edges of my vision are blurred with splotches of black and red.

I’m not sure how much time passes before I regain consciousness.