Chapter Nineteen #2
“Why won’t you help me?” I asked after I’d finished, a sudden pang of bravery and resilience returning.
“You done?” He ignored me.
“Yeah.”
A hand wrapped around my bicep, gently pulling me, the colour changing under my blindfold.
“You could just let me go now. There’s no one else here. No one will know.”
He snorted. Half a laugh.
“No one will ever know I let you go, huh? This is my place. Dougal is the only one who has a key for it other than me. Course they’ll fucking know it’s me.”
I swallowed any retort I was thinking up.
“What if I snuck out? I could hit you with something.”
Now he did laugh. Deep and hearty. Amused.
“Tiger, I’m the fucking club enforcer. There’s no way that would happen, even with your temper.”
“You’re a fucking dick, you know that?”
But he didn’t respond straight away, the tension in his fingers tightening around my arm.
“Shush,” he said eventually.
“What do you mean, shush, dickhead?”
“Jazz, quiet.” The instruction was simple. I ignored it.
“Why? Because you don’t like what I’m saying. Because you can’t take the begging? Or because you don’t like being called a dickhead?”
My anger was alight again, heat rippling under my skin.
“Jazz. Really. Fucking shut up.”
“You’ll have to fucking gag me then, ya prick.”
And suddenly he was pushing me backwards. I expected a wall to stop us. But we kept going, pacing back, the dark in front of my eyes growing darker.
“Chase. What the fuck?” I struggled, trying to get out of his grip.
“Fuck it,” he muttered.
Now the wall came at my back, cold and hard. And Chase’s body on top of it. I opened my mouth to complain. But his lips crashed against mine, capturing my words, quieting me instantly.
The world vanished, and the air was gone, stolen straight out of my lungs, every nerve lit up, sharp and bright. His lips were rough, pressed hard, almost bruising, a heat behind the force. Heat poured into me, searing through the cold that had been wrapped around my bones for days.
I couldn’t see him. Couldn’t picture the face behind those lips.
But I could taste him. Warm mint, and a tingling aftertaste.
I could smell him, stronger than ever. That same clean, woody spice that had been haunting me, overwhelming everything else in this rotten place.
And I could feel him. His lips were full.
A scratch of stubble. For a moment they lingered there, silencing me, threatening me.
His chest exhaled against my body, something switching inside him, and now those lips were moving over mine, not just silencing me.
Gently plucking, feeling their way over mine as if he was exploring.
My fists clenched, half from instinct to shove him away, half from the sudden surge of electricity racing down my arms. Every movement sparked like a live wire.
His chest was a wall against mine, solid, unrelenting.
Another wall at my back. More trapped than ever.
More prisoner than I’d been since I dropped the Hayabusa.
The scrape of stubble brushed my skin as he angled deeper, and it was wrong, so fucking wrong.
My pulse roared in my ears, drowning out thought, and the heat racing through my veins melted my insides until that resolve, that resilience faltered.
I breathed. Just a little. Opening my mouth, just a little.
And now I could feel the tip of his tongue, my lips responding, reacting to his cues, moving with his, my tongue darting out and tasting him properly, looking for the tiny sting of mint, for the heat of the kiss.
Fingers scraped on my scalp, a thumb smoothing over my cheek, pulling me closer. Our mouths duelling, half angry, half out of control. Inside me, my blood boiled, my heart simmering and a deep, dark undertone resounding low down in my stomach.
I should have shoved him off. I knew that.
Every scream in my head told me to fight, to bite, to spit.
But then his lips slowed, softer this time, slower, dragging me under.
I’d been treading water and now I was drowning, sinking with him.
Forgetting the ropes that had burned my skin, the stink of the mattress, the weight of fear sitting on my chest.
The admission burned through me, raw and reckless, but I couldn’t stop.
My lips parted further, and the taste of him deepened, mint, warmth and spice and a hint of danger.
His fingers tightened slowly in my hair, tilting me, scooping behind the back of my head like I was breakable.
Breakable. That was the worst part. How gentle he could be when every part of him screamed danger.
For that moment, we were lost. Heat surged between us, pulsing, a rhythm my body craved despite every warning my brain was throwing at me. It felt like drowning, but I didn’t want to come up for air.
And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it was gone. He tore himself back, breath harsh against my lips, body pulling away like I’d burned him instead. The cold hit me instantly, cruel and sharp.
I stayed there, lips parted, chest heaving, blindfold still pressing darkness into my eyes. Wondering what the fuck had just happened. Wondering why the absence of him hurt more than the weight of his body ever had.