Chapter 58 Tell Me to Stop – Koen
TELL ME TO STOP
KOEN
Now
Briar’s at it again. Another late night spent in that run-down dance studio over the diner.
She’s dancing again. I should’ve known she wouldn’t be able to stay off that ankle. Just like I should’ve known I wouldn’t be able to leave her alone.
I’ve got a front-row seat for tonight’s performance. I blurred the invisible line between us when I climbed in her window the other night. It’s messy now, so tonight—tonight I climb the stairs to watch her from inside.
Briar hasn’t seen me yet, too caught up in her routine to notice the man, concealed by the dark shadows of the hallway, watching her. She’s too focused, lost in the music and emotions, to see anything right now.
I recognize the routine. It’s one I’ve only ever seen her practice here, alone, never at the Conservatory.
I believe it’s her senior piece, a solo, the one she’s choreographing and performing herself.
I don’t know the criteria she’s supposed to adhere to, but the dance Briar has put together is unlike anything I’ve ever seen.
It’s the opposite of the dance she’s performing for the showcase… in every way. Instead of a stiff white tutu, she’s wearing a simple black leotard with a short, tattered skirt.
Her hair falls loose down her back, free from the neat bun she typically keeps it in when she dances.
The movement of her hair is every bit as choreographed as the rest of her body.
It whips around, wild and untamed, even tangling into her face, highlighting all the sudden changes in direction the choreography calls for.
She’s barefoot, no ballet slippers in sight, and her movements aren’t pretty or perfected; rather, they’re chaotic and desperate.
Briar’s pretty painted smile is gone, too, pain and sadness taking it’s place. The raw, unfiltered emotions are a shock to see on Briar’s usual carefully schooled face.
Her music, too, is sad and slow, haunted even, the song slowly building into something grander, angrier, with big sweeping cinematic crescendos.
Her movements grow more frantic, and instead of landing her jumps, she falls or tumbles out of them.
She breaks and doesn’t polish her spins, and she doesn’t even bother to point her toes.
Once she hits the bridge, it looks like she’s being torn apart, her body pulled in too many directions at once.
The constant change in direction wears on her, and the choreography becomes more and more disjointed, growing in its chaos until she’s near desperate to escape it.
But each time she tries, she keeps getting knocked down, over and over again, until it’s harder to get up, until, eventually, the music stops and she’s lying still, alone, in the middle of the room, her eyes closed.
Silence fills the space when the song ends, and Briar sits up, her knees curled into her chest, staring at her reflection in the mirror.
She looks so lost.
I still don’t know what she’s been through, but I hate it. I hate that anything, or anyone, made her feel this way, and I want to fix it; I want to make it better. I want to scoop her into my arms right now and promise her that nothing, and no one, will ever hurt her again, because she’s mine.
And I can just about feel the cut of the blade in my skin when I’m forced to remind myself…
She’s not.
“Do you have a boyfriend?”
“What?” Briar flinches at the sound of my voice, scrambling up off the floor as I step out of the shadows. “How long have you been standing there?”
“Answer the question.”
She narrows her eyes, wariness in her expression as she takes in the look on my face. “Not that it’s any of your business—”
It is.
“—but, no. I don’t have a boyfriend.”
She doesn’t have a boyfriend? I’m faintly aware of something deep inside of me snapping, every muscle in my body tightening, as my reasons for holding myself back from Briar begin to unravel.
I take another step closer. “Then who do you talk to at night? On the phone?” Who are you saying “I love you’” to?
“Are you spying on me?” Her eyes narrow with the accusation.
Yes.
“No.”
Fury flares in her eyes, but I cut her off before she can say anything else.
“You’re hiding something from me,” I tell her.
Almost instantly, her entire body tenses, and she averts her eyes.
She’s hiding something, I’ve known it for a while now.
Something happened, something she doesn’t want me to know.
She doesn’t trust me, and that’s fucking fair after what I’ve put her through.
So, as much as it’s killing me to know, I won’t force it out of her, but I want her to tell me.
“I thought I was repaying a favor,” she sniffs, lifting her chin back up to glare at me while crossing her arms across her chest. “You’re not entitled to know everything about me.”
I close the gap between us until only inches separate us. She could back up, but she doesn’t, holding her ground.
“No, I’m not,” I agree. Her eyes pierce into me. And I speak quieter, softer this time. “But I’m asking you; I want to know this.”
She’s so close. The smell of jasmine is overwhelming.
“Like I said, I don’t have a boyfriend; I don’t have anyone, okay? Are you happy now?” There’s a defiant gleam in her eye as she glares up at me. She’s unknowingly dancing on the fragile edge of my self-control. Neither of us moves.
“Why do you even care?” she asks, finally, when I don’t answer her, too busy fighting myself. Her voice is barely audible, even though I’m inches away from her.
It’s a question I don’t have an answer for. I know, because I’ve been asking myself the same goddamn thing every single day for weeks now, since the warehouse, since I saw her in Wonderland… since that night in the club five years ago, if I’m being honest.
I don’t have an answer.
So instead, I kiss her.
My eyes drop to her mouth a split-second before I move in, cupping her face in both hands.
Briar doesn’t kiss me back. She’s frozen, her body impossibly still, caught between shock and disbelief, but years of regret and restraint crash together in a single moment, and I can’t stop myself.
Everything I can’t say, conveyed in a single, devastating crash of my mouth on hers, the last remnants of my control shattering against her silence.
I kissed her before, really kissed her, that night at The Sovereign, but she was drugged.
I doubt she remembers it, but I do. I do, and I haven’t thought of anything else since.
And after I did it, I spiraled straight into relapse, all those years of convincing myself I’d romanticized what had been between us, how I imagined the dangerous, euphoric high that came with the taste of her.
I realized I hadn’t. But it’s darker now; she’s a sweet poison that has only grown more addictive with time, and I’m going through withdrawals.
Briar still hasn’t moved, and reluctantly, I lift my lips from hers, hovering just over them before I pull back entirely, regret washing through me at what I’ve done—a slight tremble ripping through my hands before I let her go.
Briar’s staring at me like she’s seen a ghost, wide-eyed, her lips swollen and bruised from my momentary lapse in control.
She closes her eyes, shutting them tight, hoping—or fearing—I’ll still be here when she opens them again.
Slowly, hesitantly, she reopens them. She doesn’t say a word, and neither do I, but the second her eyes meet mine again, there’s no hesitation—it’s Briar who closes the gap between us this time, her hand finding my face and tugging it back down, her lips finding mine again.
Fuck. My self-control splinters further, my hands grasping hold of her hips. I yank her body closer as I take back control of the kiss, backing her up until she’s pressed against the mirror.
“What are we doing?” she asks in-between kisses. My hands roam her body, while my mouth explores her neck.
“You kissed me back,” I tell her.
“But you kissed me first…”
“And you liked it.”
Her hands fall to my chest, pushing me back just enough so she can see my face. Her walls are down, and I can see everything she’s feeling written all over her face. There’s hope… a tiny, fragile flame of it flickering in her eyes, but it’s caged by something darker: uncertainty, doubt, fear.
“But I hate you?” Her words sound more like a question than a statement, and I stare down at her.
“Do you?” I arch a brow questioningly, a knowing smirk tugging at the corner of my lips.
“And you hate me?” She looks up at me, her eyes searching mine as if she’s desperate to find the answer in them. The usually bright blue is cloudy with all the thoughts running through her mind—confusion, apprehension, and need.
She’s right. I hate her, but not for the reasons she might think.
“I do,” I breathe, leaning back in to trail light kisses and small nips of my teeth up her neck until I reach her ear.
The shiver that rips through her when my breath hits the sensitive skin there has my cock straining in my pants.
“But I don’t have to like you to fuck you, and you can still hate me after I make you come. ”
I take her mouth again, staking my brutal claim.
I can’t stop touching her; I can’t stop kissing her.
The taste of her is not enough; I need to be inside her.
She told me she didn’t have a boyfriend, and my control didn’t just break…
it shattered. And even with my mouth on hers, inhaling the scent of her into my soul, it’s not enough.
There’s nothing stopping me now. I’m out of reasons why I should hold myself back.
Except for one.
“Tell me to stop.” I release her mouth again, moving lower, my mouth and tongue trailing down the tender flesh of her throat, my teeth grazing the surface, testing, feeling her body respond and arch against me.
“Tell me to stop, little Rose, or I swear to god I’m going to fuck you so hard, you’ll still feel me days from now. ”