Chapter Eight #2
“You don’t have to answer anyone tonight,” I say.
Her breathing starts to slow, just a little. Not steady yet, but more relaxed.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” she says, quieter this time.
I swallow hard, uncertain of what to say. I’m not built for this, but she’s here, and she came to me.
I guide her to the edge of the bed and sit down, pulling her with me. She curls into my side without hesitation. Her head rests against my shoulder, as her body trembles from more than just the cold.
“I don’t know how to talk to them anymore,” she says into my chest. “It feels so distant now between the girls and me.”
“You don’t owe anyone a fucking play-by-play,” I mutter against the top of her head. “You don’t have to narrate your trauma so they feel included.”
She exhales a shaky breath that could be a laugh, and pulls back slightly, enough to glance up at me. And that is my mistake, because now I can see her properly.
Her lashes are still damp. Her cheeks are flushed. Her hair is a mess from my hands. And her lips...
Fuck.
Her lips are slightly parted. Soft. Pink. Still trembling faintly.
My gaze drops there without permission.
Words spill out of her, broken and rushed. Something about the house being too quiet. About sitting in her dad’s chair and feeling as if the walls were closing in. About the fridge being full but empty at the same time. But I hear none of it, because all I can see is her mouth.
All I can think about is the way it felt under mine last time. The way she tasted. The way she leaned into me as if she trusted me with something I have no business holding.
What. The. Fuck. Is. Wrong. With. Me.
She is breaking down in my trailer, and all I want is to lose myself in her again.
“I just... I don’t fit in there right now,” she says, eyes searching mine. “It seems like they’re moving forward and I’m stuck.”
Stuck.
My thumb brushes lightly along her jaw without me thinking.
“You’re not stuck,” I say.
Her gaze flickers to my mouth for a brief moment before snapping back to my eyes.
That small movement affects me more than any frantic girl grinding against me in a bathroom stall ever has. Because this isn’t about performance. It’s not a game. This is a choice.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” she says softly.
And there it is. Not Sam. Not Aubrey.
She chose me.
My cock stirs at the thought, and I hate that my body reacts to something that should be emotional. My hand slides from her jaw to the side of her neck.
“I can’t stop thinking,” she whispers.
My thumb presses gently at the base of her throat. I can detect her pulse racing beneath my skin.
“I need to stop thinking,” she adds.
There it is. The same thing I pursue every time I hook up with someone. Silence. Escape.
I stare at her for a long second, not because I’m hesitating, but because I know exactly what I am about to do.
Her lips are slightly parted. Soft. Kissed once before and somehow different now.
I lean in and kiss her. Not fast. Not rough. I press my mouth to hers slowly, as if I need to feel every second of it.
She exhales into the kiss, and it hits me hard.
Her fingers tighten on the front of my hoodie, and she pulls me closer without hesitation.
I deepen the kiss—slower but rougher around the edges—my mouth claiming hers with purpose.
My cock is already hard, and I let a little of that heat bleed into how I kiss her.
Just enough to show I’m not some soft, safe option. I kiss her like I mean it.
I know I should pull away. I should smirk, say something dirty and careless, and turn this into what I always turn it into before it gets intense. That’s the version of me people recognize. The guy who fucks, gets his cock wet, and vanishes before anything real can breathe.
That is the safe version, but I don’t pull away.
I keep kissing her in the middle of my freezing trailer. My hand moves to the front of her throat, holding her gently there, while my mouth presses against hers. I let the kiss deepen slowly, without rushing or making it rough just to prove I can.
The world narrows to her mouth, her breath, and the way she presses closer as if she’s not afraid of what this is becoming.
And the fucked-up part is that I am not trying to lose myself in her. I’m fucking trying to hold on.
When I pull back slightly, I rest my forehead against hers. Her breath is warm against my mouth. I close my eyes for a second, because if I keep looking at her, I’ll break every rule I ever made to protect myself.
“Make me forget, Jace,” she whispers. “Please, for a little while. Make me forget everything.”
I swallow and hold my eyes closed a little longer, steadying myself.
I’ve pictured this more than once. What it would be like to have Bells beneath me, to hear her say my name. I know it wouldn’t be some ordinary fuck I could brush off by morning.
That is precisely why this is risky.
“This can’t change anything between us,” I murmur, opening my eyes. “You have to promise me that, Bells.”
She pulls back slightly to gaze at me. Her brows knit together, confusion blending with something else.
“I promise, Jace.”
“You need to understand that this is just... this.” I swallow hard. “It’ll only be a fuck. Nothing more. It will never turn into anything else. I don’t want it to get weird between us.”
I hate how thin that sounds and how much it matters. Weird is a misleading word for what I mean, but it’s the only one I can use without revealing the rest.
She studies me for a long moment.
“I don’t want to lose you, Jace,” she says softly. “So I promise, it won’t get weird.”
I hold her gaze a second longer, searching her face as if I can tell whether she means it, whether she can actually keep this inside the box I built. I need to believe she can.
Slowly, I reach up and slide her glasses off her face. She blinks without them, softer somehow, more exposed. I set the frames on the bench beside us without breaking eye contact for long.
I kiss her again.
This time, it starts deeper from the beginning. It gradually grows, heat weaving through it inch by inch. My mouth moves over hers with purpose, claiming without rushing. She opens for me, and I take my time, tasting her thoroughly, letting the kiss last until breathing becomes secondary.
She falls back onto the mattress, and I follow her down without thinking, hovering over her, supported on one arm so I don’t crush her.
My body presses against hers. Her lips part on mine, and a soft sound escapes her throat. It’s neither loud nor dramatic. But fuck, it does something to my head.
Her fingers thread into my hair, holding me there. That simple touch makes my cock throb more intensely.
Fucking hell, I want her more than I’ve ever wanted anyone in my life.
“Are you a virgin?” I ask quietly.
I’ve never asked that before. Because I don’t usually care enough to give a shit.
“No.”
Relief hits harder than I expect. It gives me permission to stop holding back so carefully. I can take her the way I want to. I can fuck her with intent instead of fear.
But the thought of someone else having been there before me sneaks in uninvited. Someone else’s hands on her. Someone else’s mouth. Someone else buried inside her.
It fucks with my head more than it should.
Jealousy is not my thing. I do not get territorial over girls I have no intention of keeping.
I rock against her once, letting the heat build instead of chasing it. I don’t rush; I let it simmer.
All I feel is Lola beneath me. I kiss her as if I’m trying to memorize her instead of devouring her.
That’s new and it’s fucking dangerous.
My hips press forward again, and this time she responds by grinding into me with a quiet sound that burns through my chest. It would be easy to lose control, to let this become frantic, rough, and familiar.
That’s what I excel at. But I don’t want this to be familiar. I want it to be different.
I pull away from the kiss before it gets frantic. Before I become that guy I hate and have always been.
I rest my forehead against hers, breathing heavily, cock still throbbing between us, my body desperate to finish what it began.
But I stay, choosing her over the high.
Her breath brushes my lips. Soft. Warm. She doesn’t rush me. She simply watches me.
I sit up on my knees and pull my hoodie over my head, bringing my shirt along with it.
The cold hits instantly. Goosebumps rise on my skin as the air bites in. I throw the clothes aside without looking, not caring where they land.
My pulse races, but my head is clear.
I glance down at her. Her eyes are fixed on my chest. On the ink.
The word hope sits there in rough black letters, crooked in spots, done at some backyard tattoo joint that charged me a joint and called it a deal. It’s not clean or impressive. It serves as a reminder of a version of me that believed carving that word into my skin might make it stick.
I watch her swallow.
Slowly, she lifts her hands. Her fingers are warm against my chest as she touches the tattoo carefully, as if they mean more than I’ve ever let on. Her fingertips follow the edges of the ink, lingering over the H, followed by the O, then the P, and finally, the E.
It is such a small thing, but the way she touches it makes my breath shift.
“Hope,” she whispers softly.
She speaks of it as if it’s fragile, like it could break if mishandled.
She looks up at me, which causes me to swallow.
I have never shown anyone this tattoo before. It has always been mine, something I kept hidden under layers of fabric, attitude, and bad decisions. It’s something I could glance at in the mirror when the world felt like it was against me.
It wasn’t about being poetic. It’s a reminder that there is hope out there, that one day it might actually be mine.
Hope for a fresh start. For a new damn life where I am more than the screw-up pushed aside. More than the guy people expect to fuck up. And so much more than the asshole with a hard cock and no follow-through.