Chapter 11
Ophelia
“Never Too Late-Three Days Grace”
“We can’t,” I whisper. The words come out shattered, barely even real because every single part of me is screaming the exact opposite.
He stands so close I can feel the heat pouring off his body despite the cold air wrapping around us. His hand is still on my waist. Heavy and possessive.
Familiar enough to make my knees weak.
God.
Three years and my body still knows him instantly. Still leans towards him like he’s gravity itself.
His green eyes darken at my words, jaw flexing hard. “Can’t what?” he asks.
“Kiss… touch each other… do—this,” I say, and he laughs.
“A bit late for that, Firefly.”
Tears burn behind my eyes while I stare up at him. Up close he looks different. Taller. Broader. Covered in scars I don’t recognize, and yet somehow… still Hayden. Still the boy who used to sneak through my window just to hold me while I slept.
My chest physically aches with want, which only makes me angrier. “You don’t get to stand here acting like this after what you did to me,” I say, and his expression hardens.
“What did I do to you?” he asks, pulling me against him as his hand snakes to my back, rubbing circles along my spine.
My body shivers when I feel his rough hands against my skin. But I shove against his chest.
“You let me believe you were dead!” I snap.
“I didn’t know you thought that!” he growls.
“Bullshit!”
“I’m serious, O,” he states as tears stream down my face. We’re both yelling, breathing hard.
Too emotional and too close, it's almost suffocating.
The music pounds faintly behind the metal wall while tension crackles violently between us.
“You disappeared!” I scream, stepping into his space and pounding my fists against his chest. “No calls, no nothing, Hayden! Then suddenly, you’re back acting like I’m the villain?”
His face twists into something almost pained. “I wrote you,” he whispers, and I freeze.
“What?”
“I wrote you every fucking week!” he growls. “Letters, calls, requests for visits. You never answered.”
My stomach drops, what?
“Wait, where were you?” I ask, and his face falls.
“Whitestone Pen,” he states, and I gasp.
“Hayden… I never got anything.” I say, but he doesn’t respond. Silence. Real silence this time. The kind that changes things.
He stares at me while realization slowly crawls across both of our faces. Then anger floods him all over again.
“The notes I left… Jesus Christ, you really thought I was dead.”
“You were supposed to be!” I cry “That’s what everyone told me!” I scream, and his expression changes again. Lethal and dangerous.
Then suddenly, his eyes drop.
To my hand. The ring.
Brayden’s engagement ring glitters beneath the warehouse light.
Shit, I forgot to take it off after church.
Everything inside Hayden goes still.
“What…” His voice drops dangerously low. “What the fuck is that?”
My stomach drops.
“Hayden–”
Before I can finish, he grabs my wrist hard enough to make me gasp. His eyes stay locked on the diamond like it personally insulted him.
“Tell me he didn’t put this on you.”
“It’s not—”
His thumb drags over the ring violently before he suddenly yanks my hand upward. Then his mouth closes around my finger.
I gasp sharply. His eyes never leave mine while he sucks the ring free with slow, deliberate pressure before spitting it onto the pavement beside us like poison.
The diamond bounces once against the concrete.
Hayden steps closer immediately, caging me in against the warehouse wall.
“You don’t wear another man’s fucking ring,” he growls against my mouth. “Not while I’m breathing.”
My heart slams violently in my chest.
“Hayden…”
“No.” His forehead crashes against mine while his grip tightens around my waist. “You are mine, Firefly.”
The words wreck me instantly.
“Do you understand me?” he snarls softly. “Mine before prison. Mine after death. Mine in every fucking lifetime they try to rip us apart.”
A sob catches in my throat because, God…
Nobody has ever loved me like this.
Nobody ever will.
But love shouldn't feel this dangerous. Shouldn’t feel like standing too close to a wildfire knowing it’ll burn you alive eventually.
“You can’t say things like that,” I whisper brokenly.
“Why?”
“Because I still love you.”
The confession hangs between us like something holy and horrifying all at once.
His breathing stutters. Then his hands slide up my throat gently. Like he remembers every inch of me.
“I never stopped loving you,” he whispers back. “That’s the fucking problem.”
There it is…
Because love like ours was never soft. It was a wildfire. Beautiful. Destructive and impossible to control.
“Do you have any idea,” he says quietly, “what it did to me seeing you with Brayden?” His hand gently brushes my cheek as I lean into him.
“You think I wanted him? Or that I had a fucking choice in the matter?” I seethe, and his hand leaves my face only to drag into my hair pulling gently.
“He touches you?” he asks. The question comes out rough, and I look away. He curses under his breath, then pulls away, dragging a hand down his face. “I’m going to kill him.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“Hayden, please,” I plead, and his eyes slam into mine again, and there it is.
That unbearable thing between us. Love. Raw, ugly, and all consuming. I hate how badly I still want him.
Because standing this close to him feels like every lonely piece of me finally coming home. The smell of him. The warmth of him. The roughness of his voice. It’s muscle memory. My body remembers him better than my mind ever could.
“I missed you,” I whisper before I can stop myself.
He closes his eyes like it physically hurts him hearing that. “Don’t,” he warns.
“Don’t what?” I huff.
“Say shit like that when I’m trying not to lose my fucking mind,” he says as a shaky breath leaves me.
“Maybe I want you to lose it,” I say as his eyes open slowly.
And God, the hunger in them nearly brings me to my knees.
So, I step closer this time.
Deliberately.
My hands slide up his chest slowly, trembling against hard muscle beneath his hoodie.
He goes completely still beneath my touch. “You feel real,” I whisper, and his breathing roughens instantly.
“So do you,” he whispers as tears sting my eyes again.
“I dreamt about you every night,” I say, lifting the bottom of his hoodie and running my fingers against his ribs.
“Firefly…”
“I would sleep with your hoodie because it was all I had left.” My voice cracks apart.“You still own me.”
The sound he makes is almost painful as his forehead drops against mine roughly while his hands flex at my sides, fisting into my tight shirt like he’s trying to stop himself from touching me more than he already has.
“Don’t say that,” he warns.
“Why?”
“Because I'm trying really hard to be good right now,” he says, and I giggle.
“Since when are you good?” I ask as his eyes drop to my mouth, and suddenly, breathing becomes impossible. Kiss me. Please. The plea screams through every part of me.
I rise slightly onto my toes unconsciously. And he notices immediately. “Touch me,” I whisper, and he closes his eyes hard.
“Ophelia…” he growls, and I fist his hoodie.
“I don’t care about Brayden. Do you hear me? I never stopped loving you!” I yell.
“Fuck!” He curses under his breath as his restraint cracks. One more push and he’d kiss me. One more second and I’d let him ruin me willingly.
“I need you,” I whisper, and that does it. He grips my wrists gently but firmly, stopping me from pulling him closer.
His breathing turns ragged while he stares at me like I’m his favorite kind of torture.
“Not like this,” he says, and pain slices right through me.
“What?” I gasp completely stunned.
“You’re drunk,” he says, and I scoff.
“I know exactly what I’m saying.”
“And you’re still with Brayden,” he says, his voice hardening. “I’m not touching you until you’re sober and away from that rich prick,” he growls. Rejection burns hotter than fire.
“Wow,” I say, yanking my hands free.
“Don’t do that,” he warns.
“Do what?” I ask as tears spill angrily down my cheeks. “Throw me away again?” I snap.
“That’s not what this is,” he says as his face twists.
“Then what is it?” I scream. “Because you say you still love me but you won’t let me near you!”
“Because if I start touching you right now, I’m not stopping,” he says.
The honesty in his voice steals my breath away and, for one devastating second, I almost cave completely.
Almost begged him anyway.
Because I want him too.
I want his mouth on mine. His hands on my body, and his heart beating against my chest like before.
I want my Hayden back.
But he isn’t mine anymore, and maybe I’m not his either.
That thought crushes me, so I take a step back, slowly wiping my tears with shaky hands.
“Firefly—” he says, his expression panicked.
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “I can’t do this.”
“Ophelia.”
“You being this close…” I press a hand against my chest. “It hurts too much,” I cry out, and his face softens and, somehow, that makes it worse.
Because now I know he feels it too.
The tragedy of us stands right here in the cold night air between unfinished kisses and unsaid truths.
I love him and he loves me but somehow we still keep destroying each other. “I hate that I still want you,” I whisper, and he takes a step closer.
“You think I don’t?”
Fresh tears slide down my face.
Then, before I lose all self control completely… I bend down, pick up Brayden’s ring, and I leave him standing outside the warehouse looking just as shattered as I feel, and the worst part?
Every step away from Hayden Marks feels exactly like losing him all over again.