No.No.No.
The problem with society is that we forgive and normalize asshole behavior way too easily.We let men get away with their actions and don’t even heal emotionally because that’s what we were taught from an early age.
It’s exhausting to let anyone walk all over you and ask, “Would you like to add fries with that?”Instead of saying ‘fuck you’ and walking away.
I should probably unpack that in therapy.
Assuming I stop canceling my sessions because I’m too busy putting out fires—or dodging the ones I lit myself.
“So, in conclusion ...”Roderick drawls, voice sliding into the room like warm silk over bare skin.Like he’s trying to fuck me with syllables.“You don’t have time for me?”
He leans in just slightly.
Just enough for me to catch it—that scent I’d recognize anywhere.Cedar.Smoke.Sin.Like backstage sex and stolen cologne you borrow from a stranger and never give back.
And all I can think is:What’s wrong with you, Kit?Because it seems like I still want him—or I’m just horny and he just happens to be here.
The grin he flashes is pure sin.Arrogant.Lazy.Fucking lethal.That mouth got to me more times than I’ll ever admit.It’s the same mouth that used to whisper filthy things against my neck, the same mouth that bruised my skin and made promises he obviously never kept.
“Huh, princess?”he adds, with that maddening baritone that vibrates beneath my skin.His brow arches, like he’s waiting for me to come undone.Like he’s already imagining it.And maybe he is.
Probably Bernice is ready to melt into the floor.No doubt that any woman within a five-mile radius is probably weak in the knees right now.
Me?
I’m immune.
Okay, that’s a lie.But I want to scream something like, “Get the fuck out of here,” even though I don’t.
Not even when he’s so fucking infuriating.
The way he just stands there—too still, too unreadable—triggers something wild inside me.That black sweatshirt stretches across his shoulders like it’s been clinging to him all day, worn thin in spots and still somehow infuriatingly sexy.
Like everything on him is an invitation he doesn’t bother sending.His hair’s a disaster—sex-tousled and disheveled in a way that says he’s either been dragging his hands through it in frustration ...or because someone had their fingers buried in it while he was making them come.
And I hate that I’m already wondering who’s warming his bed.Still bitter because he forgot me so easily.As if I were nothing—a nobody.
His eyes used to look at me like I was a song stuck in his throat, a note he couldn’t quite hold long enough but never stopped trying to reach.Now?I have no idea what he’s thinking.
He’s infuriating.Infuriating and beautiful and standing way too fucking close.
Close enough that if I exhaled too hard, I’d brush against him.Close enough that I remember exactly how his breath felt against my collarbone.Close enough that if he said one more goddamn word in that sex-drenched voice, I might slap him or climb him like a fucking tree.
But I won’t care.
I will never care about him again.
Ever.
“Kit, I need to know where I’m standing,” he says.
“She’ll take care of you,” Bernice assures him because it’s obvious that all she cares about is this company and my father.
Me?I could die in a hole, and she wouldn’t care as long as I’ve done my job.
ChapterThirty-Three
Roderick
