Dropping my hand, I skim over the muscles of his stomach, they jump at my contact until I wrap my hand around his length. His eyes shutter for a beat before he recovers, wrapping his own hand around me and stopping my movement.
“Talk to me, Poppy,” he pleads, looking so deep into my eyes I swear he’s staring straight into my soul.
“I was thinking actions spoke louder.”
“Not right now.” He lifts my hand from him and drops it around his waist before bringing his hand up to cup my jaw.
“How are you feeling?”
“Frustrated,” I huff.
He chuckles, knocking his nose against mine. “Don’t worry, I’ll only be able to deny you for so long. But I want to know where your head is at first. Yesterday was...”
“A head fuck.”
“Yeah, you could say that. I thought I was going to lose you, Pops,” he says on a sigh.
“But you didn’t. I’m right here.”
“I know, and I couldn’t be more grateful. Why did you change your mind... about me, us?”
“I...” I hesitate, trying to find the right words. “I needed you, Zayn. Jake was holding me, supporting me, and it meant so much to have him there, that he figured it out in the first place. But all I wanted was you.” His breath catches at my admission.
“For real?”
“Yeah, for real.”
“How did...” He blows out a breath.
“How’d I end up on the school roof?”
“Yeah. Start there.”
I tell him about what Auntie Trish said to us about our parents meeting at school and how his messages took me back to that conversation, and thankfully, it seems that it did to Jake too.
“When did he steal your mom’s cell?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. He made out like he’d been at the house a few times. I guess that’s how he knew about the drugs.”
“Wait,” he says. “He was the one who called the police on your parents.”
“Seems so. He very proudly said about how he ‘ruined my life’. He must be the worst stalker ever if he couldn’t see that my life was shit.”
“Jesus, Pops.”
I shrug. “It is what it is. It’s done now.”
“I know but... fuck.” He scrubs a hand down his face. “I can’t believe he’d stoop to that level.”
“I don’t think any of us knew the real Preston. He was screwed up in so many ways.”
The doorbell rings through the house, pausing Zayn’s response.
“Poppy,” Jada calls up the stairs. “The police are here to see you.”
“Fuuuuck,” Zayn groans much to my amusement.
“Regretting turning me down now?” I ask, quirking a brow at him.
“Fucking cockblockers,” he mutters as we both swing our legs over the edge of his bed. “Here,” he says, throwing me his jersey. “Wear this.”
“I’m not sure...” My argument is halted when I get a look at the expression on his face. After a beat, my eyes drop down his naked body, following the lines of his cut abs down to the V that drops to his very hard cock.
My mouth waters as I stare at him.
“How quick do you think I could...”
“From the way you’re looking at me right now, I’d say pretty damn fast. But that’s probably not fast enough for the officers that are waiting for you downstairs.”
“Shit, you’re right.” Dragging his jersey over my head, I push to stand. “I’ll make it up to you later,” I say over my shoulder as I walk to his door.
I make quick work of running to my room and pulling on a pair of panties and dragging some leggings up my legs.
As I make my way to the stairs, Zayn appears wearing a pair of sweats and a tight V-neck shirt.
“What are you doing?” I ask when he throws his arm over my shoulders and walks down the stairs with me.
“Coming with you.”
“But your mom,” I say, trying to push his arm from me.
“She knows.”
“What?” I ask in horror, turning to him.
“Well, she’s not said it in so many words, but she knows you mean more to me than I’ve ever let on.”
“How?”
“I have no idea. Mother’s intuition or some shit.”
“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” I say sadly.
“You’re about to learn. Nothing gets past Jada Hunter.”
“Oh God. Was moving here a really bad idea?” I ask with a laugh.
“I guess that depends if you consider falling asleep every night with me a bad thing.”
“Zayn, I’ve got my own roo—Officer, hi,” I say as we round the corner and find Jada standing with a male and female office in the hallway.
Jada’s eyes turn to both of us before she notices Zayn’s arm over my shoulder.
This time when I push it away, he allows it to drop.
“Shall we?” she says, pointing through to the dining room. “Would you like coffee?”
“No, we’re fine, thank you. Poppy, I’m Detective Archer and this is my colleague, Detective Jones. We’ve been looking into yesterday’s incident and we’re discovered a few things we’d like to speak to you about.”
“Okay,” I say skeptically, pulling out a chair and taking a seat as the officers do so.
“We went to Mr. Hellburn’s house this morning,” Detective Archer starts as Zayn drops into the chair beside me, lacing his fingers with mine. “Were you aware that Preston had an obsession with you?”
“Well, like I said yesterday, he’d been tormenting me for a while.”
“Okay, but I think this might run deeper than you realized.”
“Oh?”
Detective Jones pulls out some photographs and slides them across the table.
“Oh my God,” I gasp, as both Zayn and Jada’s breath catches.
“These are from his bedroom wall.”
I stare at the images before me. There is picture after picture of me pinned to his bedroom wall. Many of which have been taken in my house along with others I recognize like him with his hand around my throat in the school’s closet the other week.
“It seems he’s had some interest in you for a while. Were you aware these images had been taken?”
“N-no. Jesus, this is scary,” I mutter, taking in the evidence of his obsession.
“What did his dad say?” Zayn asks.
“He had no idea. But from what we gather, he wasn’t around much of the time.”
The detectives ask me more questions, but it seems that the evidence speaks for itself really and by the time they leave, they seem pretty confident that all of this is Preston’s doing.
Jada sees them out, and after a brief chat, she closes the door behind them.
“Well that was dramatic,” Harley says from behind where Zayn and I are still sitting at the dining table.
I spin around, my eyes wide as I take her in, leaning against the doorframe.
With everything that had happened, I’d forgotten about her late-night interruption.
“Zayn?” she asks.
“Yeah?”
“Fuck off, yeah?”