“That you’re going to leave. I know. At what point did you think I’d forgotten? And at whatfuckin’point did you figure I’m sofragileI wouldn’t be able to handle it?”
God, he’s stunning when he’s pathologically pissed off. I go red in the face and my hair acts like I’ve electrocuted myself with a blender. Kai is all chiseled lines and growly curses. He barely moves. Doesn’t have to. He’s like an angry dragon chucking flames at me, and my tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth.
Kai takes my silence as who-the-hell-knows-what. He gets up in my space, his face inches from mine. “I know you’re gonna leave. You’ve never pretended otherwise and neither have I. That doesn’t mean we can’t have what we have. That weshouldn’thave it. If you don’t want it anymore, that’s your choice, but you don’t get to decide it for me.”
I swallow thickly, enchanted by his nearness, his earthy smell, and the way his strong shoulders heave with the weight of his anger. “I wasn’t trying to do that.”
“So this whole thing today wasn’t you gearing up to tell me we shouldn’t get naked anymore? It was you having an ADHD episode?”
“Episode?”
“I don’t know the right words. Teach me.”
“Teach you? Fuck, I don’t know the right words. I’m a connoisseur of the wrong ones, in case you hadn’t noticed.”
Kai’s lips twitch, but I’m not hopeful enough that he’s fighting a smile. More that my bad jokes are pissing him off more. “All right,” he says. “TellmeI’m wrong.”
I can’t. Because he’s not. My brain short-circuited because it was trying to do the one thing my heart couldn’t. The thing that makes sense on paper but feels like lancing myself with a hot poker.
Kai puts his hand to my chest. I think he’s going to kiss me, but he doesn’t. He walks me backward until I’m against the far wall of the cabin, my spine to the rustic wood, then he braces his forearm above my head. “I’m not made of glass.”
“I never said you were.”
“But you were gonna make a decision based on what motherfuckin’Jaxthinks I can handle.”
I can’t deny it.
Kai grits his teeth, his honeyed eyes still dark and dangerous. “Would you back off if I was someone else? Someone without baggage? Someone like—”
“Like who?”
“Like no one,” Kai gruffs. “Everyone’s screwed up.I’mscrewed up. It doesn’t stop me knowing who I am and what I want.”
“I didn’t say it should.”
“You’re telling me I’m so blinded by good dick that I don’t know my fuckin’ mind.”
“I never said any of that either. Don’t put words in my mouth.”
Kai stares hard at me, taking me apart. And I have no recourse, cos he’s right. I never said those things, but I didn’t have to. He’s read between the lines and seen the whole story, and I don’t blame him for being mad about it. Despite what he says, he is fragile, but so am I. And so were Jax and Tanner when they met. It panned out for them, but what if it hadn’t? What if Jax hadn’t stayed?
I try to picture that and fail. Jax and Tanner are soulmates. But they’re not us. Jax isn’t me, and Tanner isn’t Kai.
“Is this why you won’t fuck me?” Kai spits out suddenly.
I blink. “You never asked me to.”
“Not with words.” He leans closer, running his nose along my jaw like a wolf. “I wasn’t sure if you wanted it.”
A snort escapes me. “You’re taking the piss, right?”
“No.”
“Fucking-A.” I close my eyes, just for a moment. When I open them again, he hasn’t moved a millimeter. Doesn’t look like he’s taken a breath. Or maybe that’s me. I’m dizzy, man. Like I’m drunk on him. “It was never not wanting to that stopped me.”
“What was it, then?”
“This.” I bring my hands to his chest, fully intending on pushing him away, but I don’t do it. Of course I don’t. I’m too fucking weak. I fist his shirt instead, tugging him against me. “You don’t understand because it hasn’t happened, but if it did, everything Jax is afraid of would come true.”
