I look at her shoulders, her arms, her hands. I watch her breathing, her anxiety. I feel it wrapping around me, because it’s the same anxiety that weighs down on me. When I look back up to catch her eye with mine, she shakes her head and breaks contact. It feels like she’s broken my spine, cutting off my airways.
I feel empty, a shell. As if I could be trampled by one clumsy step.
“I haven’t done anything, Ryan,” she says calmly, but her voice betrays her.
“You do, Christine. You…” I say, drunk from her scent, manipulating my thoughts just like last night.
I brush against her ear with my lips, closing my eyes to feel the trembling in my bones.
I push against her, pinning her underneath my body. The longing to slip my hands under her dress devours me, the desire to feel her all-consuming. The desperate need to touch her makes me slowly glide my hands up and down her sides; they’re moving of their own accord, as if someone else were controlling them. I reach her waist and increase the pressure of my touch. I need to feel everything, just once – the longing bursts through my fingers, controlling my actions.
I can’t avoid it.
I don’t want to.
“Ryan…” she wriggles away and turns. “What are you doing?”
“I’m doing what I want.”
My longing starts to possess my tongue, too.
“And whatdoyou want?”
“You.”
She narrows her eyes, and the light in them vanishes, just like this moment of madness.
“Are you crazy? Do you really think I’d just fuck you in the toilet of a bar, like any old slut?”
She gets angry, her face flaming up, her voice rising. Rejection plasters across her face, her body.
“Is that not what you are?” I raise my voice too, overcome by anger.
And it happens again.
The second time she’s slapped me. This time it’s harder.
And I deserve it even more than last time.
“Don’t you dare lay your hands on me,” I say, intimidating, even though she had every right.
She drops her hands to her sides and looks at me, furiously.
“It’s actuallyyouwho put your hands on me. And if you don’t let me leave right now, I’m going to scream. I’m not desperate enough to fall to your feet, Ryan O’Connor – not here, or anywhere else. You’re not attractive enough to get away with playing the Alpha male, who takes without asking. You might think you’re a good guy deep down, but there’s nothing good in you. Being a sex God doesn’t give you the right to treat people like shit. I won’t let you treatmelike shit.”
She turns on her heels and goes to open the door.
“You shouldn’t pretend to be a tough guy, Ryan O’Connor, when you’re not even a man. You’re nothing.”
