I steadied myself. “I already paid,” I said, then stepped by Rip and into the studio behind him.
“What?” he asked. “Do you expect me to give you a tattoo now, Clark?”
I frowned as I leaned against the counter. There were some pictures of his work hung on the walls, including some darkly shaded line drawings and portraits of people who looked similar to him and Mars, as well as an old Queen concert poster. I trained my eyes on Rip instead, wanting him to see that I wasn’t afraid.
He didn’t scare me. He couldn’t scare me, in fact. And once we were done, we would each know it.
“Maybe I do want a tattoo from you,” I said. “Maybe I want a lot of things.”
Rip’s shoulders slumped, and he ran his fingers through his hair. “I wish I could give you something that would make this better, Clark. I really do. But I know I can’t take back what I’ve done…” He winced again, then grabbed the side of the door. His fingers clenched around it, and I thought of the fury on his face when he punched the wall.
Breathe in, two, three, and relax, two, three…
“I wouldn’t accept my apology, if I were you,” he said.
My chest tightened. His voice was strained, like it was stretched across all the years that had passed. But still, that electric charge between us was the same. I could feel the heat and pain, radiating off of his body, just like I knew he could feel mine. That frustration that had made him lose control of his emotions wasn’t just his. It was my frustration, too. Anger that I had been robbed of so much, and that the world had turned on me.
Just like it had turned on him.
“I’m so mad at you,” I said. Both of my hands tightened into fists at the same time, and I had to puff out a deep breath to relax again. “I’m so mad at you for being a coward.”
He flinched when I said it, then stepped the rest of the way into the studio. The door swung shut behind him, and the rock music over the lobby speaker quieted. “A coward,” he said as his eyes burned with shame.
“Too scared to admit what you feel,” I said. My heart thudded against my chest, but there was no turning back. I needed him to hear me.
I needed to find that thing that tied us together, that frustration and heat and yearning for something more. I needed to put my hands on it and finally accept that it was there.
Binding us.
“What are you talking about?” he asked.
“You’re in love with Mars,” I said. “I can see it on your face. I can see it in every little kind thing you do for him and the way you laugh at his jokes. You love him, and you’re scared to admit it. It’s the only thing that makes sense. It’s the only explanation for why you acted like you did.”
Rip’s lips parted, and his hands opened, exposing his palms as his arms fell by his side. He didn’t have to say a word. From the look on his face, we both knew it was true.
And even though my heart tore at the pain in his eyes, I couldn’t stop there. I needed Rip to feel the full force of what existed between us, just like I felt it when I watched him yell the other night or when he cornered me all those years ago.
I stepped forward and pushed my finger against his chest. “If you hadn’t been so scared to admit how you felt when you were a kid, you would have never hurt me,” I said, tears stinging the corners of my eyes. “And now you’re too scared to admit how you feel again, and Mars and I are both paying the price.”
My heart felt like a thunderstorm beneath my ribs. I pressed my palm against Rip’s chest and felt the thudding of his heart, just as powerful as mine.
“You can’t keep making the same mistakes,” I said through clenched teeth. “I’m tired of living with your mistakes.”
“Clark,” Rip said. “I’m so sorry I hurt you again.”
His voice caught me, and I tightened my fingers around his shirt. “Do you love him?” I asked. “Tell me if you love him.”
Thud. Thud. Thud.
“Tell me!” I said again. I could smell Rip’s scent, like sweat and dirt in the air between us, and it sent a jolt of desire to the center of me.
He looked down to me and captured me with his gaze. “I love him,” he said. “I do.”
And then—something broke. Something inside of me boiled over. A neutron split in two, and somewhere far away, a star was born. The whole damn universe was born again, with different rules, different physics and chemistry.
A universe where you couldn’t hide the truth, even if you wanted to.
And so right there on Earth, I wrapped my hands around Rip’s shirt and pulled him in for a kiss.
