COMMAND

Thirty One

Rogue drove smoothly as if the road was built for him. The radio was on but kept at a very low volume; although, I hummed under my breath at the song playing on the radio, looking at the flowers in my hand.

"If you like the flowers so much, I'm giving them to you." Rogue broke his gaze on the road and gave me a brief glance; his lips curved slightly. "As a present."

I spared him a glance. "Do you always have to give me flowers that came from other women?" I challenged with arched brows. "I'm not sure what to do with that, but this will definitely be in the list of tips on how to spot the wrong man."

He chuckled. "I don't give out flowers because I don't like them," he maintained, a fire in his eyes. "They're too delicate. Too beautiful. Easy to break. More easily to get ruined."

"I thought you said you liked delicate things. Is that another one of your lies?" I watched as his fingers tightened around the wheel, yanking me back to the damage my words had done. Before I could apologize for bringing this up, I got a text from my sister.

"Oh, shit. I forgot," I mumbled to myself, reading Stephanie's text. She was here in New York, waiting for me back at home. Excitement coursed through me at the thought of seeing her but also felt guilty that it slipped my mind that she was coming today and I forgot to pick her up. God knows how long she had waited for me.

Rogue tilted his head in my direction. "What is it?"

"I forgot I was picking up my sister today. She just texted and said that she's at home. Fallon has a spare key so she let her in. I don't have to worry about her waiting for me outside."

"Great. I can't wait to see if she's like you."

My head shot to him, a little panicked. "No, you're not meeting her." It was one thing about being together, but it was a whole other thing letting him meet my family. Stephanie had a leaky mouth. Telling her about me and Rogue without sorting out our relationship first would be a bad idea. I didn't want her running off to tell people.

"Worried if I see her, I might change my mind about you?" he teased, but he was so tensed that I could tell he was angry about this.

I fumbled with my hands. "I...just don't want her to know about you yet," I said, letting out slow breaths.

The stare Rogue gave me had my stomach flipping and then tightened. I had forgotten how easy it was to fall into his fear. "We're still going to hide this, aren't we? Cool." His eyes pierced me, darkening as his breathing grew shallow.

"Just for a little while, until I'm comfortable with telling people about us. You have to understand where I'm coming from."

"I do, Beth. I understand."

"Are you mad?" I questioned, convinced of the non-existent tension in the car that existed between us. He wasn't looking at me, and even if he were, I couldn't read anything on his face.

"Of course not."

"You kinda sound mad."

"You're delusional," he threw back, and I heard the angry breaths he was releasing.

After dropping me off, I couldn't get out of the car yet unless I was sure we were okay with each other. I sat there for five minutes and he sat there with me without saying anything or asking me to get out. Finally realizing that he wasn't going to say anything and I would just be wasting both our times, my hand went for the handle.

Rogue grabbed my arm to get my attention, and when I turned around to face him, he darted out, catching my bottom lip between his teeth, the heat of his mouth sending shivers down my spine. I groaned as I tilted my head to the right to deepen the kiss and his tongue brushed mine softly, making my stomach tight. Finally, he broke the kiss and tilted my head back to plant a soft kiss on my neck before he pulled back.