Chapter 18 – Dakota
YOU’VE CREATED A MONSTER
DAKOTA
Iwas never really one to think I’d made mistakes, didn’t believe in dwelling on the past, but for the first time in my life I was pretty sure I’d fucked up.
I never should’ve told him. But knowing me, there wasn’t any reality where I didn’t tell him.
I could be patient.
And now that I’d learned about his past, I could be even more patient.
I could wait forever. The walls he’d built made perfect sense now, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to tear them down anymore.
That felt too disrespectful, like I’d be invalidating everything he’d gone through and the only way he’d found he could cope.
I’d climb over them and meet him where he was instead.
There were four days left in our winter break, and I wanted to spend every single second with Reese.
He didn’t want to spend one single second with me, however. He was too busy.
Too busy ignoring me.
Well, not exactly. But he’d slid his walls back up after my confession. Or—and I liked this thought better—he wasn’t able to put his walls back in place and was just avoiding me because then I’d see the truth.
He was just scared, which only made me want to hold him. Comfort him. Chase away those fears and show him there was nothing to be afraid of. Not with me.
Well, maybe there was. I’d kind of turned into a stalker—except I was very bad at it, so I didn’t think it even counted.
I went around campus looking for him every day—it’s not like I really had anything better to do—but I never found him; I didn’t know where he was hiding, but it was making me anxious. He was doing what he did at the beginning of the semester: coming in after midnight when I’d already fallen asleep.
I couldn’t stop thinking about what we’d done at the cemetery, either.
I wanted to do more with him. I wanted all of it with him. Everything. Anything he wanted, or I wanted, or we wanted. I was cooking up fantasies that would turn him into a tomato in half a second if he heard what they were.
I was so, so tempted to tell him.
If I ever found him.
I would have to lure him out of hiding somehow.
I decided to use the only weapon in my arsenal I could think of that might draw him to me: our project.
We’d worked on it here and there, but if we didn’t get going on it soon, we’d fall behind.
I was only fifty-fifty that he’d even respond, though. All my texts to him had gone unanswered, and my only consolation was that he’d been reading every single one.
So I kept sending them.
Me:
Where are you?
I cleaned up your side of the room. I’m thinking about taking it, actually. It’s not fair you get the window the whole time, you’ve hogged it long enough.
We can forget everything that happened, okay? You don’t need to avoid me like this.
As soon as the words were typed out and sent, my chest felt too tight, and I wanted to delete the message.
Fucking hell, I couldn’t forget a single second of what happened. Reese’s touch had been imprinted on my skin, seared into my psyche, and the enormity of how it all made me feel was too much to just lock away in a box.
Me:
Never mind, I lied. I honestly can’t forget any of that, they were some of the best moments of my life and I’d do all of it the exact same way if I was given a redo.
I don’t think you understand what you’ve done. You’ve created a monster, darling.
Fuck, Reese. Can’t you at least tell me if you’re okay? I know you’re reading these.
See, you read that.
And this one.
You’re still reading them.
When do you want to practice our duet? Class starts up again soon and I don’t want to fall behind.
That finally got a response from him.
Tiger Darling:
Can you do today at four? I’ll reserve us a booth.
Me:
I can do anything you want
He didn’t respond again, but he read the message. I felt like him reading the messages was as good a response as any. It was like when he glared at me without saying anything. Those eyes of his communicated everything just fine.
And I was going to see those gorgeous eyes again soon.
Fucking yes. Finally.
I practically skipped my way to the music building; I was so excited to practice with Reese that I got to the sound booth half an hour early.
I had to wait while whoever was in there finished up, so I was sitting on the ground near the door when I spotted Reese coming down the hall.
He had his backpack and his violin and an adorable sour expression on his face.
I was smiling like an asshole as he approached, but the closer he got, my smile started to wane until it fell completely. Panic scraped under my skin, constricting my lungs until I felt like my chest would burst.
I shot to my feet and framed his face in my hands, tilting it so I could see the bruising near his left eye.
“Whoa, Dako—”
“What the fuck happened? Did somebody do this to you? Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere else?”
Images flashed through my head, of Reese’s body covered in ugly bruises, and anger exploded through me.
Reese grabbed my wrists to stop me from going any lower—I wanted to check his entire body—and squeezed while staring up at me. I couldn’t stop looking at the bruise, and a hard knot was forming in my stomach.
“Dakota,” Reese said softly.
Fuck, my name on his lips—said with such soft affection—was the most perfect thing I’d ever heard.
I brushed his hair back, taking in the whole size of the bruise. Purple and gray were at the center, right by the corner of his eye, fading into green and then red. It wasn’t very big at all, maybe the size of a dime, but it must’ve hurt.
Had he iced it? Had he done anything to take care of it? He needed something, he needed—
“Dakota!” Reese said, louder. He gripped my jaw in one hand and held me still so he could catch my gaze. His eyes were dark green and brown, the freckles in his left one barely visible. They were so fucking pretty. Where was the gold?
Who the fuck had hurt him?
“Who did that to you?” I rasped, holding his hair away from the bruise. “Reese, what the fuck happened?”
He was looking at me with a strange expression, brows drawn together as he chewed on his bottom lip.
I slid my fingers down his cheek—so damn soft—and tugged his lip free from those vicious little teeth.
“Don’t do that, you’re gonna make yourself bleed,” I said, slowly trailing my thumb along the plump flesh.
He grabbed my hand and pulled it away from his face but didn’t let go.
“Nobody did this to me, I bumped into a door frame,” he said, lowering his gaze to my chest. “Just leave it alone, Dakota, I’m fine.”
Frustration burst through me. “You’re not fine! You look like you got punched in the face!” Just saying the words brought more anger to the surface, and my chest started heaving as I stared at the ugly evidence of him getting hurt.
And where was I? Fucking around, texting him nonsensical shit and waiting at the dorm like a damn puppy for him. Was this why he hadn’t come back? Was he hurt somewhere else and just didn’t want to tell me?
“Are you hurt anywhere else? I swear to god, if you lie to me I’ll just strip you down right here, right fucking now, and check every inch of you myself, so tell me the truth,” I said, setting my hand under his jaw and leaning down until we were eye to eye.
Reese’s lips parted in surprise as he stared into my eyes. Red bloomed across his cheeks, and his pupils dilated as he breathed raggedly.
I was being utterly batshit, out of my mind with worry, and I didn’t fucking care.
I needed to know he was okay.
“You’d strip me down in public?” he finally said. His voice sounded lower. Huskier. “If you thought I was lying, you’d take all my clothes off right here, right fucking now?”
“I…” Had I really just said that? What was wrong with me? “Um, I wouldn’t…”
Reese stepped closer, his tongue darting out to moisten his lips as he stared avidly into my eyes. There was gold in all that green and brown now, like he was suddenly sparking to life right in front of me.
“No, don’t do that. You said it. In fact, you threatened me with it.
And you sounded pretty committed. So? You’d rip all my clothes off right here if I lied to you?
” His voice was a purr now, a melodic, throaty thing that wound its way deep into my mind.
It hummed beneath my skin and burned across every nerve ending until I couldn’t even think properly.
“Yeah,” I said, swallowing against the sudden dryness in my throat. I wasn’t entirely sure what we were talking about anymore. “I’d rip all your clothes off.”
Reese tilted his head a fraction until the tips of our noses brushed together. His eyes were all I could see, all that existed right now.
“How will you know I’m lying?” he whispered, his warm breath fanning across my lips.
“Because,” I whispered back. “You always lie. You have a mean little lying mouth.”
I saw his face change infinitesimally as he started to smile, and oh, fuck—
The door to the music booth burst open right next to us, and Reese shoved me to the side to stop it from hitting me.
I blinked, trying to get my mind to turn back on, figure out where I was. Who I was.
“Oh, shit, sorry. Didn’t know you guys were right there.” A tall student holding a small black case shouldered his way past us.
“Come on,” Reese said, nudging my arm. He was holding both our violins, and without waiting for me, he walked into the music booth like he hadn’t just upended my entire world and stolen my sanity.
He was a thief and a liar now.