Page 27 of Dirty Hit
He’s still in his chair: one hand draped loose over the armrest, the other brushing along his lower lip like he’s holding back a smile he’s already enjoying too much. Then the smirk finally breaks through anyway, slow and filthy and infuriatingly satisfied.
I glare at him. He looks delighted by it.
“Screw you,” I say, and don’t give him the satisfaction of another reply. I turn and walk to my car on legs that feel both steadier than they should and weaker than I want them to be,gravel crunching under my shoes. The night is cool, quiet, and far too normal for what just happened in that house.
I get in, shut the door, and sit with both hands on the steering wheel, staring straight ahead. The cottage glows warm behind me in the rearview mirror, deceptively ordinary.
Then it hits me.
Dominic calling me back wasn’t an impulse. It wasn’t some last little jab because he couldn’t resist. It was a test.
He wanted to see what I’d do if he tugged.
He wanted to see whether my body would obey before my brain caught up.
He wanted proof that when he reached for the line between us, I’d step over it on my own.
And I did.
Brendon
Myalarmgoesoffat six thirty, like it always does. For a second, my body moves on autopilot, hand reaching out and brain already cataloging the day: class at eight, office hours at ten, meeting with Professor Hart at one, study group at three, and lesson plans for the undergrad tutorials in between.
Jericho lifts his head, ears twitching at the noise, then flops back down with an offended little huff, his tail flicking against my calf.
Last night slams into me with the kind of force that knocks the air right out of my lungs, and instead of hitting snooze, I slide it away, and stare at the screen for a full minute, my thumb hovering over my email app.
My heart is pounding, even though I’m just lying there alone in my shoebox apartment, the ceiling fan rattling quietly above me. My chest feels wrong, tight and hollow at the same time. My cross chain is twisted, digging into my collarbone.
“Take a sick day,” I say out loud, surprising both me and the cat.
Jericho’s ears flick toward me, and he blinks slowly. Unimpressed.
My brain immediately comes up with a dozen reasons why that’s irresponsible—I’ll miss notes, I’ll fall behind, I’ll screw up someone else’s schedule, I’ll disappoint the professors who expect me to be reliable—but all I can think about is Dominic’s voice in my ear and the way my own body betrayed me in that cottage.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I type out quick messages to the department secretary, saying I’m sick and won’t make it in, and to Professor Hart, apologizing for missing our meeting and offering to reschedule. I tell my study group to meet without me and that I’ll catch up on the notes. I don’t even give a reason. I just hit send.
The guilt hits instantly because of course it does, it’s the constant background noise of my life. But underneath that is relief. The idea of not having to walk across campus today, not having to see people, not having to plaster on the “everything’s fine” face, makes my muscles sag back into the mattress.
My phone starts vibrating almost immediately as the replies roll in, so I flip it and drop it onto the nightstand. I can’t deal with the concerned messages, the “hope you feel better” and “let me know if you need anything.”
I don’t need anything. I need less.
Less responsibility.
Less expectation.
Less acting.
I shut my eyes again and pull the blanket up over my head, willing my body to relax. I tell myself I’ll sleep, because I need rest. That the tight ache behind my eyes is from exhaustion, not from the loop my brain’s been running all night.
Except lying here in the dark, my thoughts have nowhere to go but backward. I stare at the inside of my blankets, and all I can think of is last night and what I did when I got home.
Heat creeps up my neck just thinking about it, and I shove the covers down so I can breathe.
I never do that.Ever.I’ve trained myself out of it since I was a teenager. You learn quickly that the only time you ever feel relief is the same time you feel like God is watching you with disappointment.
So you stop reaching for that relief. You learn to clench your hands into the sheets instead, curl up, and ride it out until the feeling passes. You tell yourself holiness means starving yourself of anything that makes youwant.
