Page 113 of Ignition

“Yeah?” He half-smirked, as if I’d handed him a compliment instead.

He pulled me closer, until I was standing between his parted legs. The hand on my neck lowered, trailing down the side of my ribs, then my waist, before slowly loosening my fist that had clenched at my sides. He dragged my palm to his chest, right over the thrashing heart underneath.

“Why don’t you show me how much you hate me then, hm?” he said, in that patronising tone that shouldn’t have made my insides clench like that.

“Come here.”

He coaxed me closer, until I perched on his thigh, and his arm snaked around my hip, holding me tight.

“It doesn’t work like that,” I hissed, squirming to get away, but he held me fast, pressing my side into his chest.

His other hand pulled my hair off my shoulder, exposing my neck, and though I knew what was coming, though my brain screamed to scamper up, or I’d get sucked into it all over again, I couldn’t move.

“Like what?” His thumb brushed my pulse point, then trailed up my ear, spearing a shiver down my spine that I hoped he didn’t feel.

“Like this. You hurt me, hide me, and then—”

“You’re the one who freaked out after the movie.”

The words hit a little too close to home, though he couldn’t have known why. In a flash, I wasn’t in a silent seminar room, but outside in the wintry night, seeing his face crack in front of me. My jaw stiffened, but telling him I’d been equally hurt felt dangerous, so I glowered at him and reached for something else.

“What, like you were gonna parade me around after that?” I snapped, wincing internally at how it came out almost as a plea.

“I… don’t know…”

His eyes shuttered away again, but I didn’t need a decoder this time, he’d explained why he couldn’t openly date me. Even so, the newly scabbed-over part—the one that had wanted it to be real—whispered caution in my ear.

“Well, figure it out!” I hissed, squirming harder, before freezing two seconds later when the reality of what I was struggling against kicked me square in the chest.

In a dizzying burst of stubbornness, I jolted to my feet, nearly kicking him in the groin, before momentum and his hands dragged me back onto his lap, and I gripped his shoulders for balance.

Both his arms banded around my waist as he leaned his forehead against mine and drew in a shuddering breath.

“I’m trying, Mia. I’m trying, goddamn it!”

His voice cracked on the curse.

It was that, more than anything, that allowed a sliver of doubt under my walls.

Something in my chest squeezed until I couldn’t breathe.

In a dash of masochism I absolutely shouldn’t allow myself, I slumped into the embrace.

I believed he was trying.

Failing spectacularly, but trying.

Confusion washed over me all over again.

God damn it.

The breath punched out of me as my hands rose tentatively, trailing a slow line over his arms, until they settled between his shoulder blades.

We pulled back enough for our gazes to lock.

I watched his pupils dilate, my turmoil churning behind his thick lashes, and then, there were no more words. Only heat and desperate mouths clawing at each other.

The worry of someone walking in faded to somewhere outside these walls, far away from where his groans vibrated onto my mouth and his hard chest pressed into me, stealing my breath.