Page 96 of Blades Out
I understood completely. This felt inevitable. Like fighting gravity. Like denying the sun would rise. Every choice I'd made to create distance had only delayed what we both knew would happen the moment our walls crumbled.
Her hands twisted under mine—not escape, just restless energy seeking outlet. I released her wrists.
Immediately her fingers tangled in my hair. Pulling. Demanding. Holding me to her like I might disappear again.
I ripped myself away.
The separation felt like tearing skin. Like violence. My chest heaved, lungs fighting for air that wouldn't come. Every muscle locked rigid with the effort of not closing that distance again.
Olivia stood frozen against the wall. Lips swollen. Eyes dark and dazed. Chest rising and falling in a rapid rhythm that matched my own ragged breathing.
I backed up another step. Then another. Hands shaking at my sides.
"If I touch you again, I won't be able to stop."
The words came out rough. Desperate. A warning she needed to heed because my control was hanging by a thread so thin it was already fraying.
She didn't move away. Didn't run. Just stared at me with those eyes that saw too much. "Maybe I don't want you to stop."
The whisper punched through my chest. Soft. Certain. Devastating.
My jaw clenched so hard something popped. "Don't say things like that."
"Don't tell me what to?—"
I snapped. Closed the distance in one stride and crashed my mouth to hers. Harder this time. Consuming. Past restraint or reason or any pretense of control. My hands buried in her hair, angling her head exactly where I needed it. She gasped against my lips and I swallowed the sound, pressed her harder into the wall, feeling her body mold to mine like we'd been designed to fit together.
Her fingers clawed at my shoulders. Pulling. Demanding. Matching my desperation with her own.
This was insanity. Reckless. Everything I'd sworn I wouldn't do.
I didn't care.
Her taste flooded my senses—sweet and sharp and perfectly her. The small sounds she made drove me wild. Need built in my chest, my stomach, lower. Dangerous. Overwhelming. The kind that led to decisions I couldn't take back.
Stop. Stop now before you ruin everything.
I tore myself away mid-kiss. Stumbled backward. Put three feet of space between us before I could change my mind. My hands clenched into fists. Breathing like I'd just finished overtime.
Olivia sagged against the wall. Eyes wide. Lips parted. Looking as wrecked as I felt.
Neither of us spoke.
The silence pressed down. Heavy with everything we couldn't say. Everything I couldn't let happen no matter how badly I wanted it.
I turned away. Fast. Before I could watch her face crumble. Before I could see the hurt bloom in those eyes and break completely.
My feet carried me down the corridor. Each step fought against every instinct screaming to turn back. To apologize. To explain why I kept doing this—kept touching her like she mattered then walking away like she didn't.
My shoulders shook. Trembling with the effort of keeping forward momentum. Hands clenched so tight my nails bit crescents into my palms.
Don't look back. Don't turn around. Don't?—
Her voice didn't follow. No footsteps chased me down the empty hallway. Just silence. Heavy. Devastating.
Good.
She needed to let me go. Needed to understand I was poison. That everything I touched turned sharp and ruined. That staying would only hurt her worse than leaving ever could.
