Chapter 9 Beck
BECK
For a guy who absolutely does not want to see Brody Miller, I’m spending an alarming amount of time trying to keep tabs on him.
Not in a weird way. Or an interested way, even. It’s a strategic way.
A know your enemy’s movements kind of way.
A make sure he doesn’t sneak up behind you and reenact the worst moment of your life but worse kind of way.
Totally normal captain stuff.
That’s what I tell myself as I sit next to the window on the third-floor common room, pretending to scroll my phone while actually staring at the parking lot like I’m waiting for an important package.
Freshmen play pool behind me, yelling and laughing and living their carefree lives while I sit here marinating in dread and lust and shame and whatever the hell else this is that I’m feeling.
I haven’t been sleeping well this weekend.
Not since… Okay, that first night I slept like a goddamn baby.
I’m not even sure how I got back to my room, all I know is I woke up pantsless with my dick in my hand.
But as soon as the morning fog cleared from my mind and I realized what I had done, and what I had dreamt about all night, I couldn't deal. Every time I close my eyes, I’m back in the stairwell. Back under his control.
You like this.
I bet you want to come for me.
Come.
Lust crawls down my spine. I pinch the inside of my arm until it stings and the feeling eases.
I’m a mess. A complete catastrophe of emotions full of rage and humiliation and an overwhelming urge to jerk off constantly.
And the worst part is, I don’t even know which of those feelings is the loudest.
Sometimes I’m furious. Livid. I’m pissed and embarrassed and pissed at just how embarrassed I am, and I want to beat the shit out of him.
I live on the edge of ready to fight him the second he walks back through the door and prove I’m not the weak, pathetic, shuddering mess he saw last week.
Brody caught me by surprise and I acted out of character, but it damn sure won’t happen again. In fact, if Brody even looks at me funny, I’ll make him sorry he ever glanced in my direction.
Then again, there are moments when I remember—no matter how much I try very, very hard not to remember—the absolute burning euphoria that coursed through my veins. Because of the way he looked at me. The way he took control of my mind and my body. It was like everything else just melted away, and—
Nope. No. Absolutely not.
I pinch my arm harder. I shouldn’t get enjoyment out of the terrible, degrading things he said to me. Or the way he looked at me like I was nothing, just a sorry piece of meat that he found wanting.
And I didn’t. I didn’t like it.
I don’t like that sort of thing. I don’t want it to happen again.
Ever.
Not even a little.
God. I need help.
Just when I convince myself Brody might have come to his senses and decided to drop out of school or transfer back to the Midwest, headlights swing into the lot. My breath hitches as Brody’s shitty blue hatchback pulls in.
Brody climbs out and rolls his shoulders back like he might be sore. His posture suggests that he’s tired, as if the weekend drained him as much as it did me. He grabs his duffel and starts towards the dorm.
I definitely do not scramble down the stairs to the main lobby and casually sit on one of the couches near the door. That would be ridiculous.
When our eyes meet, it shouldn’t come as a surprise. But I startle. He holds my gaze for three seconds, maybe four. Long enough that something tightens low in my gut.
Then he takes a step forward and opens his mouth like he might want to say something. And nope.
Nope. Nope. Nope.
I’m out of my seat before the thought finishes forming, knocking into his shoulder as I push past him and out of the building to sprint down the walkway that leads to Caty’s campus apartment.
I practically break her door down with the force of my knocking.
She opens it mid-sip of a Diet Coke, blinking at me as I fidget nervously in her doorway. “Jesus, Beck. Did you kill someone? Do I need to help you hide a body? You know there are people that you can pay to do that, right?”
“I need to talk,” I choke out.
She widens her eyes and steps aside. “Well, this should be good.”
I drop onto her sofa and bury my face in my hands.
It takes a few deep breaths to get started, but once I do, the words pour out of me.
I tell her everything. And I do mean everything—The stairwell, how he held me against the wall with his hand on my throat, the way I froze and didn’t fight back.
The way my body reacted, the way he reacted, and the way I’ve been spiraling ever since.
By the time I finish, Caty has tears streaming down her cheeks.
From laughing.
“Caty, this isn’t funny.”
“Oh, honey.” She wheezes, clutching her stomach. “It’s hilarious.”
“Catyyyy,” I moan, burying my face in a throw pillow.
“Big, scary, uptight Captain Lincoln Beckett got manhandled by the guy you’ve been treating like shit for weeks, and you liked it.”
“I didn’t like it,” I snap.
“I do believe you just said, and I quote, I came so hard I nearly passed out and he didn’t even touch me. Babe, that means you liked it. You liked it a lot.”
I groan. “Why are you like this?”
She wipes a tear. “Well, we know why you’re like this.”
I glare.
“What? Beck, I’ve been your beard for two years. I could give a TED Talk about how your brain works and your fucked up family dynamics.”
“I don’t want to hear this.”
“Shush. Yes, you do.” She sits back, crossing one leg over the other. “Let me tell you exactly why you reacted the way you did.”
“I didn’t react—”
“Oh my God, shut up. You reacted so hard you nearly blacked out,” she says. “Literally and figuratively.”
I bury my face in the pillow again. She rips it away. I never could hide from her.
“Listen,” she says, all fake-serious. “You’ve been under pressure your entire life.
You’re the golden son of a demanding man, captain of a team that worships you, a straight-A student.
You’re the worst kind of perfectionist and judge yourself for every perceived slip, even things beyond your control.
You can never falter, never have a single crease or crack in your perfect little facade. ”
“Caty.”
“This is relevant,” she insists. “Because of what that kind of pressure does to a person. Especially someone wired like you. All that self-control? All that rigidity? All that need to be in charge of every little thing around you?”
She taps her fist lightly against my forehead. I reflexively run my fingers through my hair to smooth it down.
“You’re a rubber band stretched so tight you squeak when you breathe.”
“That’s not—”
“And when someone finally out-muscles you,” she continues, her voice softening just a fraction, “when someone takes the control out of your hands, even for a second? Your brain interprets that as relief. A release valve. A break from the constant strain you put on yourself.”
I go very still. Because as much as I don’t appreciate being read, what she says definitely checks with how I felt in that moment.
She nudges me with her foot. “It’s not the degrading that gets you hot, babe. It’s the surrender. The letting go. The feeling of not being the one responsible for once.”
My cheeks burn, and Caty looks entirely too pleased with herself.
“It’s why you’ve always had issues getting it up during finals week or whenever your dad breathes too close to you. I’ve told you for years that you need therapy, a weighted blanket, and better lube.”
I glare harder. “Shut up.”
“And it’s why this thing with Brody hit you so hard,” she finishes, voice turning gentle in the exact way that makes it worse.
“Because in that moment, even though you were mortified, overwhelmed, and terrified he’d see too much…
your body interpreted the loss of control as the first actual breath of relief it’s been given in who knows how long. ”
My chest feels tight. I feel embarrassed and exposed. Not so much because Caty recognizes all of this. But because Brody obviously did, too. Who else can see through me well enough to tell that I’m really just a tightly wound freak?
“And that,” she says, grabbing her Diet Coke, “is why you came like a porn star on fast-forward.”
“Caty.”
She pats my knee. “Congratulations, sweetheart. You’re not a freak. You’re just emotionally constipated.”
“Fuck you.”
“Um, no thanks. Ew. Not my thing. Although I am a top, and you are clearly a bottom.”
“The fuck I am!” My cheeks flame with indignant anger. I love the girl, but how dare she?
“And who said that’s a bad thing, honey? Do I need to delve into all the reasons you consider bottoming negative? Because they’re almost all the same reasons why you’re going to loooove getting fucked.”
“No one is fucking me. And I hate you.”
“No you don’t. Because I will always tell you the truth.
” She smiles sweetly, the same smile that fools my dad and all the other socialite parents.
“And because I always tell you the truth, I’m going to be honest about one more thing.
You fucked up, Beck. Messing with his car was a low blow, and you’re lucky he didn’t actually beat the shit out of you. ”
“First of all, I didn’t mess with his car—”
“You knew it was happening and didn’t stop it. Same thing.”
“And second, he wouldn’t beat the shit out of me. I could take him.”
Her grin is slow and savage. “You’re right. I bet you would.”
My entire face, chest, ears, and brain feel like they might burst into flame.
Caty pats my knee. “You should probably apologize and pay him back for the tires. We all know he isn’t as well off as the rest of the students here, those probably set him back more than however much time he lost since he was clearly on his way out.”