Edge of Bliss (Love on the Edge Book 3) Read online

  “I love you, woman.” He pressed me to him tightly. “More than you’ll ever know.”

  Dash

  “GET DOWN!” I screamed at the top of my lungs so Blake could hear me over the roar of the tornado that churned up the earth a hundred yards away from us. My shouts weren’t enough. She barely ducked as a flying branch darted a breath over her head. I flinched as if the sharp wood had been aimed at me, pushing against the intense winds and pouring rain as I crossed the distance to get to her. “Blake!”

  “That was a close one!” she said, adrenaline making her brown eyes glow. A crazy laugh ripped from her lips, her hair and clothes soaked from the rain that wouldn’t let up.

  I crouched beside her, one hand inspecting her face despite knowing the branch had missed her, and one hand continuing to aim the camera at the EF-3 we’d driven five hours across Texas hoping to catch.

  Blake returned her focus to the beast, as did I, though it was hard to take my eyes off her after seeing a tree almost take her head off. Dangerous debris wasn’t new to me, nor was getting injured on the chase—nothing major so far, luckily—but everything shifted inside me when it was Blake in the heart of the storm next to me.

  I loved it, but I also kind of hated it. The idea of her getting hurt . . . it turned my insides out where all the nerves were exposed to every kind of fear. I couldn’t lose her. I loved her too damned much. So much in fact . . .

  The ring I’d been carrying in my pocket practically burned against the jeans I wore. Paul had told half the truth when he’d explained to Blake that he’d become a certified officiate to pick up girls—that did happen—but he never entertained the idea until I had mentioned I was planning on proposing to Blake at some point on our trip down tornado alley. Of course, I hadn’t figured out when that time would be, or if Blake even wanted that—she had been adamant about her disbelief in the institution of marriage since the day I met her. I hadn’t even asked her to move in with me because I’d known she needed time after everything that had happened with the asshole, Justin.

  His name and last night’s news flashed angrily in my head. Damn him for cropping back into her life a year later, just when she’d been close to gaining back all the self-worth he’d abused out of her during their time together. He was the reason I wasn’t down on one knee right this second, begging her to spend the rest of her life with me. But I wanted to do it before we were done chasing. I wanted to ask her to be officially mine forever in a place that fueled both of our passions. Because I’d known since the first kiss, there was no one more perfect for me than her, and I wanted to spend my life making her happy.

  “Hail!” Blake yelped, covering her head as icy pebbles took the place of the rain that had been soaking us moments ago.

  The pellets hit our exposed skin like bee stings, but she didn’t bolt for the truck. Blake held her ground, her eyes on the massive tornado that had now turned black, the sky gray and slick behind it. It was well past time to go—and that was a fact I never cared about before Blake had become my chase partner either. She was the one who used to pull me off dangerous storms, and now it was the other way around.

  “We should get back to the truck,” I said closer to her ear so I didn’t have to shout.

  She winced against another hit of hail, a tiny sliver of blood trickling down her neck. “Look at that rotation!” She pointed at the monster that continued to rip trees from the ground, working its way toward a wooden fence fifty yards west of it. “It’s strong. We can’t leave now!”

  My heart swelled, and a rush of want slammed through me harder than the force of the storm we captured. “We’ve got enough. Come on.” I tugged her arm, ignoring the way she looked at me—incredulous and shocked.

  She planted her boots against the ground, halting our momentum. “Look!”

  I focused on the tornado again, watching it as it snaked back and forth as if it were a depraved being trapped in a straitjacket, trying to escape its bounds. With how wide it was, the monster looked that much more menacing and captured my attention like nothing else could.

  Instinctually, I turned the camera to get the best angle, wanting the footage to be prime for analysis when we got it back to the lab. The same itch I always had when I saw a tornado do something unexpected scraped the edges of my mind. I wanted to unlock its mysteries, peel back the layers of nature and science and coincidence, and really sink my teeth into why these things behaved the way they did.

  Of course, I knew better than to ever think I would ever truly understand, but it didn’t stop me from trying to figure them out in an attempt to better predict their patterns when they dropped too close to populated areas.

  The image of my childhood town, demolished as if it had been chewed up and spit out, flashed behind my lids and I glared at the tornado in a challenge. It would not push me around. It would not chase me ever again. I held my ground, the rest of the world fading into the background as I pointing the camera like a weapon in my hand, sucking up the tornado’s energy with every beat of my heart, capturing every angle, every piece of footage I could to someday beat it.

  And then, all at once, the rotation weakened, the twisting mass slowing, stuttering like someone had unplugged its power source. It was a matter of seconds before the base dissipated, followed quickly by the rest of it breaking into what looked like puffs of smoke. And, just as always, I had the rare combination of relief and disappointment wash over me.

  I lived for storms like that one. For the tornadoes that challenged me, scared me, pushed me to be a better chaser. Which only made them more beautiful and terrifying to me at the same time. Because without them, I wouldn’t be what I was, but with them, danger always followed. It was a battle, every single time, but I was hooked. I’d never stop chasing, just as I knew I could never prevent them from happening.

  “And you wanted to leave,” Blake said, drawing me out of myself.

  I grinned, picking a piece of hail out of her hair and tossing it on the dirt road with the thousand others that sprinkled on the ground. “You used to be the one to call it. Am I a bad influence on you?”

  She glanced up at me, biting her bottom lip. “Absolutely, without a doubt.”

  I dropped my hand to glide down her arm. My fingers trembled from the adrenaline surging through my veins. From the way she shook next to me, Blake was coming down, too. I kissed her softly, enjoying the gentle warmth her lips offered to my frayed nerves. Chasing had never been this hard . . . or this enjoyable. I knew she was stronger than anyone on my team, smarter too, but that would never change the fact that I didn’t want anything to happen to her.

  Suddenly her dream job of forecasting weather reports on a network—tucked safe and sound, day in and out, within a brick building—didn’t seem like such a bad idea.

  The sound of several vehicles crunching on the dirt road made me pull back from her, just enough to catch the heat in her eyes. The look jerked on my core, begging me to rush her back to the new hotel we’d checked into that day.

  “You sure now how to pick them, Blake!” John yelled, his head hanging outside the Tracker Jaker’s window.

  “You really do,” I said, nudging her shoulder as a flush raked over her skin. She had pointed us in the direction of Turkey, Texas—instead of hanging around another day in Lindale, like the initial plan had been.

  “Lucky guess,” she said, shrugging.

  “Right. Like the last two catches were luck too?” I cocked an eyebrow at her.

  “Exactly.”

  I couldn’t understand why the woman would never take credit for how incredible she was. Another aspect I blamed firmly on her ex. He’d stepped on her every time she’d tried to fly, so much so it was second nature for her to discredit anything she ever did spectacularly. Like read weather data and spot storms in the sky no one else could. Her skills were invaluable to the team—even if I wasn’t madly in love with her—and I knew for a fact it was one of the reasons the network had signed us for so many episodes. With
Blake remaining on the team as a stipulation—they recognized her skills and wanted to utilize them. Couldn’t blame them either. “Guess you’re just my lucky charm then, huh?”

  “Don’t ever forget it,” she said, walking toward the young assistant, Brandon, who met her half way and took her camera from her. She moved to talk to John, who leaned against the Tracker Jacker, his hand over his eyes to block the sun that had decided to come out now that the dark mass had finished throwing its tantrum.

  “EF-3 wasn’t good enough, man?” Paul asked, clapping me on the shoulder when he reached me.

  “Keep it down, dude.” I gazed over his shoulder, happy that Blake was solely focused on whatever John was saying.

  “Relax, she can’t hear me.”

  I tilted my head. “You’re louder that a warning siren, especially when you sleep.”

  “You don’t want to play the who is louder when they sleep game with me, Dash.” He shook his head. “Though, I guess you never really sleep anymore, do you?” He waggled his eyebrows, and I punched his arm. “What? You two are . . . disgusting.”

  He’d said the word without so much as a hint of the definition, though I’m sure we were annoying. John and Paul were usually put in the room right next to ours, and hey, we tried to be quiet. It wasn’t my fault I liked to take Blake to the edge in every form possible.

  Okay, yes it was. I fucking loved watching her let go and give herself over to me completely, loved watching her come undone underneath me, above me, any way we pleased.

  “Ugh,” Paul grunted. “Back to my question. That one was a beaut. How could you not pop the question?”

  I hissed, glancing at Blake again, who was thankfully oblivious. “I never should’ve told you.” He hadn’t stopped bugging me about it since I had, like some overexcited kid who couldn’t wait to open his Christmas present. “Why are you so jazzed about it?” Not that I wasn’t, but nervous was dominating me at the moment.

  I still wasn’t sure marriage was something Blake wanted. I hoped that the love I had for her over the last year had changed her thoughts about marriage, but there were some dark parts of her—thanks to her previous relationship—that I knew would take way more than a year to mend. I was prepared to wait, but I didn’t have a clue if her opposition to the marriage idea had shifted or not yet. Hence, waiting for the perfect moment.

  “I don’t know, man. You two are perfect for each other, and she’s become like the sister of our group. I want you to make an honest woman out of her.” He smacked my chest, and I laughed.

  “I’ll ask her when I know she’s ready. When the moment presents itself. Not a minute sooner.”

  He huffed. “Seems like a lot has to line up just to tell the woman you’re in love with that you love her and want to be with her.”

  “You’ll understand when it happens to you.”

  “Please,” he said, shifting his weight as he crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m like Bruce Wayne, a perpetual bachelor.”

  “Are you comparing yourself to Batman?” Blake asked, walking up to us.

  Paul raised his chin at her. “What if I was?”

  Blake shrugged, threading her fingers through my hand without even thinking about it. “Just saw you more of a Spiderman guy myself.”

  “Why?” he asked, his eyes glaring at her like it was a trap.

  “Because of your preference for redheads,” Blake said, shrugging like it was so obvious.

  I nodded. “She’s got you there.”

  Paul grinned, pointing at her. “You,” he said. “I like you.”

  “Thanks for that, Paul. I was worried you hated me.”

  “But let’s get serious for a second,” he said, locking eyes with her.

  The shift in his mood had my chest tightening, and I glared at him, promising pain if he even so much as hinted about our discussion.

  “What’s up?” she asked, giving him her full attention which was way more than he deserved, especially if he blew this for me. I would kill him. Blake shook her hand out of mine, squinting at me in question like I’d been squeezing it too hard without realizing it.

  “There is something I need to ask you, Blake,” Paul continued, and I clenched my eyes shut.

  “Oh, God. What is it?” she asked.

  He released a deep sigh. “Why do hurricanes travel so fast?”

  I snapped my eyes open, resisting the urge to roll them to the sky, but relief pooled in my chest. Fucking Paul.

  Blake didn’t bother baiting him, knowing he didn’t need it.

  “Because if they traveled slowly, we’d have to call them slow-i-canes.” Paul laughed at his joke, as he often did, but as always, it was so infectious we all ended up with stitches in our sides.

  “You really had me on that one,” Blake said, reeling in her laughter. “I thought for sure you were about to be serious for once.”

  Paul cut his eyes to me, shaking his head before looking back to Blake. “Don’t worry,” he said. “That’ll never happen.”

  Blake

  “YOU AREN’T READY yet?” Paul called from Dash’s and my hotel room, his voice carrying through the closed bathroom door.

  Dash’s eyes widened, the overhead lighting reflecting in his vivid greens. He dropped his head against my chest, the shower running despite the water being lukewarm. When we’d climbed in—after the chase that had left us covered in tiny hail scratches and soaked clothes—it had been scalding.

  “Whoops,” Dash said, chuckling as he unwrapped his arms from around my waist.

  “You gave him a key?” I whisper-hissed at him, stepping carefully out of the shower and grabbing a towel.

  He followed me out after shutting off the water. “I always do. In case I forget a piece of equipment and he needs to rush back and get it.”

  A pounding on the door had me clenching my eyes shut, but I couldn’t stop the smile that spread across my face.

  “Come on, you two!” John hollered from the other side of the door. “We’re finally close to a proper club, and I’m ready to see if Linda still works there!”

  “Coming!” Dash practically growled at them and hit the door for good measure.

  “Yeah, I’ll bet!” Paul said, and I clenched my eyes shut, heat rushing to my cheeks. “Meet you at the truck!”

  I sighed, quickly drying off. “I didn’t realize we were in there that long.”

  Dash smirked. “You were quite distracted.”

  “You are so bad,” I said, pushing at his hard, wet chest as he came to wrap his arms around me again. He nuzzled my neck, lightly nipping at my skin.

  “Pretend you don’t love it.” He scraped his teeth against me.

  My eyes rolled back in my head, and I arched against him, the towel separating us threatening to drop with one more well-placed kiss from him. “No,” I said, pushing his chest again. “We promised the boys we’d take them out tonight.”

  He continued to soothe the bite he’d given me with his tongue. “I didn’t realize we already had children,” he said, his breath warm on my skin.

  I chuckled, the mere thought of having Dash’s babies sending an incredible thrill through my center. Of course, it was followed directly by a fear cold enough to ease the pulsing heat inside me.

  My last relationship had left me with a kneejerk reaction to all things marriage and children—the idea of Justin as a father had literally given me nightmares at one point. He’d been selfish and inattentive enough with me and I couldn’t imagine how he’d be to a child, so I’d simply decided one day that those ideals weren’t for me.

  After falling for Dash, and him showing me what real love was, I’d slowly warmed up to those ideas. With him, nothing seemed impossible anymore. And while I loved Dash, babies were at least several years out. We hadn’t even moved in together yet.

  One step at a time.

  “Close enough,” I finally said, giving him one final shove. “And you know I refuse to disappoint them.” I smiled, giving his half naked body a g
ood up and down look before reaching for my clothes. “Go entertain them while I rush through the grooming process.”

  He smacked my butt as he walked toward the door, reminding me of all the times he’d done the same to “punish” me for saying sorry without reason to. “You’re gorgeous no matter what you do. Don’t take too long.”

  My cheeks were thoroughly flushed when I glanced in the mirror, a look I liked to call bliss a la Dash. I bit my lip, forcing myself not turn into a gooey puddle right there on the hotel bathroom floor. Sometimes—when I actually stopped and thought about how lucky I was—it hit me like a tidal wave. I had no clue how I was able to earn Dash’s love but damn was it amazing. The happiness I’d experienced over the last year was almost enough to erase the turmoil that had occurred in the previous eight.

  Almost.

  The smile melted right off my face as the officer’s voice sounded in my head for the umpteenth time. I’d tried to drown out the guilt, but somehow, I worried over what had happened to Justin. I had no clue if his aunt had shown up to be there for him or if he’d woken up alone and then got carted off to jail. I knew I shouldn’t care, but it was a trigger inside me. He may have demolished any love I’d had left for him the last night we’d seen each other—the memory of which continued to give me nightmares, just not as often as in the beginning—but it didn’t mean I wasn’t a human being who remembered him as the young boy he’d been when we were growing up.

  Forcing the worry away, knowing I had nothing to do with or have any control over the situation, I focused on the scent of Dash on my skin. Somehow, I still smelled like him despite the shower we’d just taken. It was intoxicating and made me feel like his in a way that nothing else could.

  Quickly gathering my wet hair into a ponytail, I dabbed some gloss on my lips and bounded out the door, knowing Paul and John wouldn’t stand for me taking the time to put on a whole face worth of makeup. Besides, Dash didn’t care if I was done up or soaked in rain—he loved me for me.