Not slow.
Just controlled enough to pretend I’m not unraveling.My boots crunch on old grit, echoing down the corridor like a countdown.
When I open the door, she is sitting on the bed, knees drawn up, hair wild, dirt streaked down her legs.She looks like she was dragged out of the graveyard by the throat.She looks like she crawled through the dark and dared it to swallow her before coming home to me, anyway.
Becki looks like a sin that crawled home.
To me.
Her eyes flick up.Cautious.Defiant.Beautiful.
Something inside me snaps.
I slam the door shut, and the echo hits the walls like a warning shot.
“Thought you could outrun me?”I say.
She doesn’t flinch.“Thought I already did.”
Her voice is too steady.
Too brave.
Too goddamn seductive in the way only a terrified girl can be.Her chin is lifted just a fraction, but it is enough to set my teeth on edge.Enough to make my control go thin.Transparent like glass about to shatter.
I take two steps toward her.
She stands.
We meet in the middle like a crash.The air between us burns.
“You don’t get nights alone,” I say.“Not anymore.I’m chaining you to my bed in the basement.”
“You don’t own me.”
“I should.”
The confession spills out of me, hot and unhinged, like it has been trapped behind my teeth for years.“I should’ve claimed you the first time you looked at me like you wanted to burn.”
Her chin lifts.“Then why didn’t you?”
Because I was afraid.
Because I wanted to deserve her.
Because she is the only thing on this earth that might break me.
But I don’t say any of that.
Instead, I move.
Fast.Instinctive.Dangerous.
I grab her waist, pinning her back against the wall so hard her breath kicks out.My body cages hers.She breathes in sharply, terror or yearning or both, yet she doesn’t turn her eyes.Her fingers curl into my shirt like she is deciding whether to claw me or cling.
“You’re shaking,” she whispers.
“You make me shake.”
