Page 34 of Everything You Hate
I clamp my jaw shut. Because yeah, that’s exactly where the sentence was headed, and hearing it in her mouth instead of mine makes it sound uglier than I meant it.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“It’s exactly what you meant.” Her voice is shaking now, and not from cold. “You looked me up. You watched the clip. You decided who I am from three minutes of security footage, and everything since then has just been you looking for proof?—”
I kiss her.
I don’t remember making the decision. I just want her to shut up and stop talking about herself with so much hatred, and so I wind a hand around the back of her neck and pull her toward me.
She makes a small noise of surprise against my mouth—half protest, half warning—but I don’t stop, and after a second her body slumps into mine like I’ve punched the air out of her. She’s soft and tense at the same time, rigid in her shoulders, but her hands clutch the front of my shirt instead of pushing me away.
It’s messy. Too much teeth at first. My nose bumps hers, and I think I taste tears and anger and salt. She opens for me, and I take it. I crowd her up against the porch railing, both hands caging her face, and I kiss her so hard I know it’s going to bruise. I want it to bruise. I want her to remember it every time she talks shit about herself, every time she tries to turn herself into a fucking headline.
She kisses back. Hard. Like she’s trying to draw blood. The jacket slips from her shoulders, and her hands slide under the collar of my shirt, nails digging in like she’s angry at it, at me, at something bigger than either of us. I don’t care. I want more of it. Want her pressed close, want her hands and teeth and heat, want whatever the hell is happening here to burn off everything else.
She tastes like red wine and the salt of her tears. Her hair is everywhere. I slide a hand into it, grab a fistful at the base of her skull, get greedy with it, and she gasps into my mouth. It goesstraight to my head, to every part of me that hasn’t woken up in years.
I should stop. I know. She’s the worst possible idea. Everything about this is wrong, and still, when she bites my lower lip, I nearly lose it. The railing is the only thing keeping us upright.
I pull away. Hard. The movement is so sudden her head knocks back against the porch’s support beam, and I catch it before it hits, hands gentling from fists to open palms on either side of her skull.
We’re both breathing like we just sprinted a mile.
She stands there, stunned, hands twisted in the front of my shirt, not letting go. Her lips are swollen, and there’s a smear of red along her chin from my stubble. The sight of it makes me want to go back in, to finish what I started, to get drunk on her heat and her anger…
But I don’t. Instead, I step back. Put two feet of cold air between us.
“This can’t happen,” I say, voice raw.
Her chin lifts, and she crosses her arms. “Agreed.”
“Good.”
“Great.”
Fuck. I wipe a hand over my face, trying to get rid of the taste of her lingering on my lips, and go back inside without looking at her again.
The kitchen swallows me. Dishes, laughter, Hazel chasing Mimi’s schnauzer, Sprocket, around the table legs with a spoon she is not supposed to have.
Bodhi catches my eye from the dining room and reads my face like a balance sheet. He does not look happy.
Colter grins at me and opens his mouth to comment, but Zade slaps a hand over his lips, keeping him silent.
Mimi appears at my elbow with a dish towel. “You look like hell.”
“Thanks.”
“What happened out there?”
“Nothing.”
“Dean.” Her voice drops. Just for me. “Don’t you lie to me, kid.”
The screen door creaks. Scarlett comes in with my jacket folded over her arm and hands it to me without a word, then crosses to Shea at the sink and says something that makes Shea laugh.
“I kissed her,” I say. “Then told her it was a mistake.”
Mimi closes her eyes. “Christ, Dean.”
