Page 45 of Break Me Open
“You’re bad at lying to yourself,” I say. “Which is inconvenient for you but extremely entertaining for me. Go cool off, Caiden. Take a walk, have some water, and try not to pick a fight with anyone bigger than you.”
“I can handle myself,” he bristles.
“Oh, I have no doubt,” I purr. “We’ll... revisit that later.” The way his breath hitches at the word “later” would be embarrassing if it weren’t so gratifying.
“You’re not just going to walk away,” he says, like he honestly can’t compute that I’d let this go without dragging it into a full-on scene.
You poor, stupid, beautiful man.
“Of course I am,” I say, stepping out of his space. “We’re on base. We both have duty in the morning. And I’m not a teenager.”
“What does that—”
“It means I know the difference between flirting with disaster and handing it a written invitation,” I say, tipping my head, then look him over once more for my own private archive. “You want more? You can work for it.”
His jaw clenches, and the muscle ticks. “You’re unbelievable,” he mutters.
“Correct,” I say. “Try not to fall in love on the way back to your bunk, hm? I’m very bad for you.” I turn before he can say anything, because that’s the only way this works. If I linger, even for another ten seconds, the part of me that’s still humming with the feel of his mouth will drag me right back in.
I can feel his eyes on my back as I walk away around the corner. I don’t look back, I only let myself breathe properly once I’m out of sight. I shove my hands into my jacket pockets andstart walking, not entirely sure where I’m going until my feet choose for me. My heart is still going too fast, in the deep, thrumming after-effect of a near-miss. I feel wired, like I’ve just disarmed a bomb with three seconds left on the timer — because make no mistake, that’s what that was.
A bomb.
There’s no one close enough to see me, but I keep my face neutral anyway. I’ve practised that look so long it’s practically muscle memory at this point. It’s the one that says nothing touches me, nothing shakes me, nothing gets in.
It is, of course, a lie.
He thinks he’s the one who snapped, lost control, and I’m the one walking away untouched. He has no idea that the only reason I’m walking in a straight line right now is that I’ve had more practice than him at bleeding off adrenaline without showing it.
I cross the yard, past a couple of conscripts loitering near the barracks door, smoking. They nod when they see me, their eyes dropping automatically. I nod back, curtly, and keep moving.
Back in my room, the air is warm and stale. Most of the bunks are occupied. So, I slip in quietly and head for my bunk. My bed is a narrow strip of mattress, and a blanket folded messily from this morning’s rushed departure. There’s a paperback face-down where I left it, and a mug with a dried coffee ring on the little shelf. I sit heavily on the mattress and drop my head into my hands.
The second I’m still, everything hits me properly.
I can still feel his hands on me, the heat of his palm through the thin fabric, and the way he pulled me in like he’d made his mind up and fuck the consequences.
Most people, when I push them, either fold or bark. He grabbed me, he kissed me, and he did it knowing exactly who I am.
That’s new, dangerous, and equally fascinating.
I lie back, eventually — because sitting makes me feel like I’m about to jump out of my own skin — pulling the blanket over my chest and staring up at the underside of the bunk above me.
Instead of sleeping, I let my mind run and think about when I first saw him. I think about the training yard and the mess hall afterwards. His eyes flicking between Niko and me, wondering where the hell to put his attention. He’s been circling this for weeks. So have I. We’ve just been lying to ourselves about what we’ve been doing.
Well, I haven’t, I’ve known what I’m doing since day two. Winding him up, pushing him, seeing what he’ll do if I give him somewhere sharp to put all that restless energy. What I didn’t expect is that I’d like the answer quite this much.
We need to be more careful. This place isn’t kind to men like us. There’s a reason I keep my hands to myself here, keeping my flirting to words, looks and the occasional accidental brush in a doorway. I know what happens if you’re careless. I’ve seen it.
I should never have let him get me outside, alone. I should never have let him get that close without an exit already mapped out and a fallback plan in place. But then he looked at me like that. Like he’d finally stopped fighting himself and decided he’d rather jump than stand at the edge one more second.
I press the heels of my hands into my eyes again. No. We’re not doing that, attaching meaning to one kiss, spiralling into thinking about futures, or under any circumstances, letting the words “what is this” form with anything other than mockery.
This is simple. He’s hot, he wants me, we’re in a pressure cooker with no release valve, and the lid finally rattled hard enough to let some steam out. That’s all.
My brain, unhelpfully, replays the confused look on his face when I stepped away. Leaving him standing there, half-hard, was as much a tactic as it was self-preservation.
If this is going to happen — and let’s not pretend it isn’t, because the way he kissed me says there is no turning that tide back now — then it has to be on purpose. Not half-hidden behind a building, where any idiot could wander past. It has to be somewhere I can control the angles, the risks, and the fallout. Off-base, ideally. A place where I can take my time with him without checking over my shoulder.
