My heart pummels against my ribs, and I think she can feel it, how each hit rattles and vibrates my entire chest, pushing through and out to hers.
Her chin raises in defiance and her nose almost brushes the tip of mine, and I try not to let myself think about her tits beneath my T-shirt—the one she’s wearing—that I can feel grazing against my core.
I swallow, my hair falling around us.
And when she speaks, I feel the weight of her agony settle across me.
“How dare you,” she chokes on a whimper, but she’s not crying. “How fucking dare you…talk about my father like that.”
My heart falls to the pit of my stomach like a stone when I realize what I’ve done, what I’ve just said.
“Offedhimself, are you fucking for real right now? You cold…”
She stops there, and I want to continue for her,cold, careless, heartless sack of shit.
I don’t though.
“Laiken…”
I try to speak but she tugs at her arm, and when I don’t let her go, she gets closer, so close that our eyelashes touch. Laiken whimpers under her breath, “Let me go.”
But I don’t.
Not even when the clubhouse door clashes in the distance.
And especially not after what I just carelessly said.
I keep hold of her.
And this time, she doesn’t try to move, doesn’t try to pull away. Her green eyes fall to my lips, and I can feel her heartbeat at my core quicken when she realizes now just how close we are.
She keeps her eyes to my mouth as I push one thumb to the pulse in her wrist, feeling it flutter.
“Is that what you want, Laiken?” My voice croaks. “For me to let you go?” I let the question settle between us, then I tell her, “I already did that once.”
A clearing of a throat,Harlen’s, comes in the distance and I hear the steel door slam again before he takes himself back inside.
Laiken’s pulse rises marginally. “I fucking hate you,” she spits her words in my face.
And I look toward our feet, then back at her again, relief settling like pins and needles beneath my skin.
“Good,” I tell her. “You should.”
Laiken’s throat dips as she swallows. She doesn’t like that. Her face contorts; she’s shaking her head. If she had the guts to spit on me, I imagine she would.
“I’ll hate you until the day I fucking die.”
I’m already nodding my acceptance before she’s finished speaking.
“Good,” I repeat.
A heavy silence settles between us.
I press my finger to the pulse at her wrist a little harder, then, acceding to her request, I let her go.
Laiken stays in front of me a moment longer before clicking her tongue against her teeth, taking a step back and pushing both sides of her hair behind her ears.
I know she wants to say more. Her cheeks are red and blotchy, heated with anger and the unspoken, but she turns and makes her way back to the clubhouse.
