“I don’t want you,” he said, and hedidn’t.
“You’re allowed to want me.”
“I hate you.”
“You’re allowed to hate me too.”
Something flickered in his eyes again. A vulnerability he was determined not to give me. But he would. Eventually.
I wasn’t sure why I was so set on Jonah. I didn’t understand this pull between us either. But unlike him, I wasn’t going to question it. It was too big, too powerful, too inevitable for me to fight it. I didn’t even want to try. Instead, I surrendered to it. I just had to figure out how to get Jonah to do the same.
nineteen
Jonah - Past
I LOVE THE WAY YOU HATE ME.
Dex Weller was a very, very dangerous man. Dangerous in ways I hadn’t anticipated and was entirely unprepared to deal with. He had the power to hurt me in ways I was realizing extended beyond split lips and broken knuckles. Ways that would take far longer to heal if I didn’t keep him out.
I meant it when I told him I hated him. What else could this possibly be? These feelings so bright and intense. Like a blazing fire. And yet I couldn’t let them go. I let them burn me because existing without them felt so cold. I’d been so fucking cold for so long without him, and I hadn’t even known it.
Willingly, I clung to the embers he ignited within me, but I blamed him for the way they burned. Of course I blamed him. Blaming him was simpler.
It had been a week since I’d seen Dex at the party. Since Iknewwhat it felt like to have him touch me, so much more than the twisted fantasies I’d long given up fighting against. And although it was meant to be a one-time thing, a way to satisfy my fantasies so I could silence them once and for all, they had only grown more intense. I still wasn’t ready to give in tohimyet.
“You’re the devil,” I told him.
“Your devil,” he replied without hesitation.
“What?”
“I’myourdevil.”
“What… what does that mean?”
He shrugged. This motherfucker.
“I don’t understand you,” I told him honestly.
“So ask me. Ask me anything, and I’ll tell you.”
Why did I believe him? Why did I trust him when I didn’t want to? When all the logic and reason inside me told me I shouldn’t.
Pale eyes locked onto mine—water on fire—like I was the only thing he could see. And it did feel like hesawme, like he actually looked at me and saw everything that was inside me. I didn’t like it. I didn’t want him to stop. Only Becca looked at me so closely, and even that was different. I didn’t know what to do with this. With him.
“Why am I drawn to you?” I thought out loud, wondering if he had the answers that I didn’t.
“Because something in you is the same as something in me. Feral dogs seek feral dogs.”
It should have been an insult. He didn’t know me. No one fucking did. But I felt like he wanted to, and that terrified me just as much as knowing that deep down I wanted to know him too.
“I hate you,” I told him again, like I could convince him it was the truth, like I could convince myself.
“I love the way you hate me.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. Hate me more. Despise me, Rabbit. Loathe me. Detest me. Abhor me and let me feel it. Let me taste the hatred on your lips, let me drink it from your skin and feel the heat of it burning inside you. Burn me with it.”
