She earned that.
“How’d you figure it out?” My voice is normal now, without the forced higher-pitched, and the recognition is clear in her eyes, widening with every syllable.
“What?” She crosses her arms tighter, and I don’t bother to glance down and enjoy the view. “You’re not even going to try to deny it?”
I shrug, stretching my arms up and hooking my fingers atop the doorframe, my palms facing the door at my back.
I lean forward, lowering my face closer to hers. “Why would I? You won. You figured it out. I’m not going to take that away from you or try to convince you that you’re crazy.”
Desperately, her eyes search mine, anguish in her blue stare, like she’s surprised I didn’t try to lie my way out of getting caught.
“Your team key chain. It broke and I found a piece in my closet.” She pauses. Her usually smooth voice is now raw and pained as she continues, pain lancing her face, “Was this all a game to you? Some sick, twisted bet between you and your friends?”
I wet my bottom lip, readying to respond, but I don’t get a chance before she continues to spew her hatred.
Every thought that has been building up since this started flows out from her red-painted lips, each point emphasized with a jab to my chest.
“Why did you do this? YouknewI had boundaries. YouknewI didn’t want to date my dad’s players, but you pursued meanyway, manipulating my fantasies to get your way into mypants.” She gasps for air, unaware that she’s drifting closer to me, closer to never being able to escape when I wrap my arms around her and remind her who she belongs to.
But I refrain and let her continue.
“Am I just a toy? Entertainment for you and your friends? Was it fun getting over my walls and invading my space for shits and giggles?God,I can’t believe I fell for this trick!”
Her bottom lip quivers with anger, and she lightly slaps my chest in frustration.
If she wants to take her anger out on me physically, I don’t blame her, but there are other ways we’re going to be doing it, and it involves far less clothing.
“I actually believed that you—masked you—really cared for me. That you were falling for me or loved me. But you were justusingme for your entertain?—”
I cut her off, my hands flying out from my sides, one going around her throat, the other on her mouth, careful not to smear her lipstick. But even if I do, I don’t care. It would show everyone else in the room out there that she’s mine, her lipstick on me like a brand.
I’ve had enough of her berating speech. We need to get a few things straight before she keeps going, if she even wants to by the time I’m done.
Her eyes widen as I yank her toward me, both hands flattening on my chest by instinct. She doesn’t pull them away.
Dropping my face to hers, I sink lower, pressing my lips to her collarbone, the base of her neck. Flicking the tip of my tongue up to her earlobe. She whines in protest, and I groan, pressing my lips to her ear, breathing heavily.
My voice is threatening, the same huskiness she’s used to with her secret admirer. “You think just because the mask is off, our dynamic changes?” It falls to a haunting whisper. “You’re wrong.”
She’s not scared.
She doesn’t want me to leave.
If she did, I would.
But she doesn’t.
Her chest is rising and falling heavily as she breathes through her nose, quick, shortened breaths. The blacks of her eyes are shot, nearly filling the pretty blues swirling around them.
The softs of her cheeks are flushed with a hue of light rose, part of which could be due to the alcohol, but the rest is because of me—because even though she knows she shouldn’t, she wants me without the mask just as badly as she does with it on.
She just might not be ready to admit it. But we’ll get there. I’ll help her to see that not a goddamn second of this is what she thinks it is.
“Serena.” I exhale her name like I was always meant to, my forehead rolling against hers, my hands still secured over her throat and mouth.
She doesn’t push away or protest as I ease my handfrom her lips. The second I do, the warmth of her breath intertwines with mine.
Peace. Calm. Heaven.
