"A little. But only for a second."
"Fuck." He tucks his dick back into his pants and zips them up. Then he gets to his feet. "You were a virgin."
"I'm…what? No, that can't be. Everyone thinks I must be twenty-eight years old."
"Maybe you were a—" He winces and averts his gaze again.
"What did you almost say? Maybe I'm what?"
He shoves his hands into his hair. "Maybe you were a nun."
"I don't feel like a nun." Sitting up, I struggle to pull up my jeans and panties. "What we just did, it felt familiar. Like I've done that before."
"That can't be. You were obviously a virgin."
He sounds irritated again. Is it my fault I was a virgin and didn't know that?Hello, amnesia girl here.Besides, I do feel like I must've had sex before. But that makes no sense. I recognized what an orgasm should feel like, and I sensed that before I reached my climax. I just knew what was coming and how good it would feel.
Nothing about me makes any sense.
Gabriel grasps my hands to pull me up off the ground. "The lightning stopped."
"I know. It completely stopped right when we came."
"That's insane. Sex has nothing to do with it."
"How do you know? You're not an expert on Echo lightning."
Gabriel snares my hand, half dragging me out into the clearing where the camp lies. A few tents have fallen down. Nothing else seems to have been damaged. Would the lightning have kept going if Gabriel and I hadn't screwed each other? I wonder if the lightning somehow fed us erotic energy. I've been attracted to Gabriel since the moment we met, even when he was acting like a jackass. But I didn't experience intense lust until we ran through the woods together amid an Echo lightning storm.
What does that mean? I don't know, and I'm not sure I want to find out.
Gradually, the residents of Sanctuary wander back into the camp. Though everyone wants to talk about what's going on and what it might mean, I can't focus on the conversation. My mind keeps rewinding to those moments at the edge of the forest when Gabriel had taken me like a maniac and I'd loved it.
Can anyone tell we did that? Does it show on our faces? I can't look at him without my entire body growing warm, and every time Gabriel glances at me, he immediately swerves his gaze away. I wonder if the lightning somehow made us insanely hot for each other. It was paranormal lightning, after all. As much as I'd love to blame the Echo for what I did, what we did, I know I can't do that. I wanted him, and I did something incredibly stupid because of that lust.
Never again.
I sneak away to my tent so I can try to erase that incident from my memory. I got amnesia once without wanting it to happen. Why can't I pull off self-induced memory loss that only wipes away those moments with Gabriel in the woods?
Someone rings the bell on my tent flap. "May I come in, sweetie?"
That's Erin. Every tent has a small clump of jingle bells attached to the outer flap that acts as a doorbell. We all understand the value of privacy.
"Sure, come on in," I say.
Erin walks in and sits on the canvas chair across from the cot, where I sit. "Are you okay? You haven't seemed quite like yourself ever since the lightning came again."
I know she didn't mean that in a dirty way, but hearing the words "came again" makes me flash back to Gabriel in the woods, inside me, thrusting wildly.
"Sarah? What's wrong?"
"Nothing, I'm fine." I shake off the memory and try for a smile. I don't think I pulled it off. "The lightning keeps coming for me, doesn't it?"
Erin says nothing for several seconds, then she moves onto the cot beside me. "Yeah, we think it is after you or Gabriel—or both. You guys were together both times the lightning struck, right?"
I nod.
She lays a hand on my thigh. "Don't worry. We'll figure this out, all of us, together."