Chapter 30
Dakota
When I left my class building, Mason was waiting there. I almost wanted to turn around and run back inside the building to hide. There was no reason he should’ve been waiting for me, and thinking about it made me nervous. But I stayed, wanting him even when I shouldn’t.
“Why are you here?” I asked, stepping to the side of the walkway so other students could use it freely. I noticed a few of them staring up at him while they passed, intrigued. “And how are you here?”
“I’m here to see you.”
“Answer my second question,” I demanded, crossing my arms.
“I drove here, then started walking across campus once I ran out of roads.”
“You know that’s not what I meant,” I snapped, irritated. I wanted to know how he found me. Sure, he knew I went to school here now since he’d been the one to drop me off earlier, but I never gave him my class schedule.
When he didn’t answer, I got my phone out. My suspicions were instantly proven correct; he’d shared my location with him while I was asleep last night. I unshared it, turning my glare back on his face.
His expression was making me uneasy.
Something was wrong.
Why couldn’t things ever just be simple with us? There was always something darker, something worse going on. In my mind, I wanted to pretend Mason was the only one causing all this, but my heart was corrupted too. I yearned for this.
I dug us deeper, too.
“I don’t want you to have my location,” I said, squeezing my phone tighter so my fingers wouldn’t tremble.
“But I need you.” He pressed his fingers into the side of my jaw, stepping towards me, my heartbeat stumbling. I was starting to notice how tormented his face was, how wrecked he looked—like he was grasping for something. For me? Why?
“What’s wrong?” I asked, stomach turning. I had no idea what was going on, why he seemed so different right now, but I knew I didn’t like it. The longer he stared at me, the heavier the pit in my stomach got, anxious anticipation spreading all under my skin.
“Come back to my car with me.” He coasted the pad of his thumb over my lips lightly, tracing the shape of them.
“Okay,” I agreed, already regretting it.
Mason took my hand, but he wasn’t speaking now.
He interlaced our fingers, pulling me along with him, each step further triggering my fight-or-flight reflex.
He wasn’t stable right now. It felt like this morning when he’d dragged me out of the shower to fuck me on the floor, like he needed to own me.
But it was stronger now. It scared me on a deeper level.
It almost felt like it wasn’t about me at all, but I was still going to be the collateral damage.
“Mason,” I said to catch his attention, but he didn’t look down at me, continuing to walk towards the parking lot. “Mason, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”
He refused to answer me. It looked like he hadn’t even heard me, or he just didn’t care to answer.
I could see his car now, barely visible through the trees. This part of campus was pretty secluded, surrounded by forest on the edges. I stopped walking, digging my heels in when Mason tried to drag me with him, trying to yank my hand away from him.
His eyes snapped to mine.
“Tell me what’s wrong.” I made my voice forceful to hide the edge of fear lurking in it.
“I’ll tell you in the car.”
“Tell me here,” I insisted. My knees were shaking, my breaths becoming uneven. A gust of wind blew across the yard, whipping my hair around my face, making the tree branches sway wildly, rippling the fabric of Mason’s shirt. Clouds darkened above us, sweeping in the start of a storm.
“In the car.” He was firm in his speech, but I could see in his eyes that he was shaken by something.
I stopped trying to get away. I stepped towards him, reaching up with my free hand to hold his face. His eyes slid shut for a moment at my touch on his cheek, his jaw, but he didn’t let go of my hand, as if he was afraid I’d run the second he loosened his grip.
I won’t run. I promise. Just don’t lock me in there with you.
Tell me what’s wrong.
“Mason,” I said softly, pressing up on my tiptoes to brush my lips over his. “Tell me.”
His eyebrows pulled together, pain filtering through his expression. He tightened his hold on my hand and I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from wincing at the force of it.
“Would you let me fuck you right now?”
“Don’t change the subject.” My fingers were trembling slightly, still against the side of his face. “Look at me.”
“Why won’t you come with me?” he questioned, brown eyes latching onto mine.
“I will, I just…” My voice trailed off, the end of my response getting stolen by the wind. I didn’t even know what to say, really. All I knew was I didn’t want to get in that car with him. Not now, not when he was like this. I had no idea what he’d do.
“Then come on,” he said while squeezing my hand, pulling me with him. His voice was cutting, angry, and it made me flinch, tears stinging the backs of my eyes. I just nodded, hating myself.
“Okay,” I breathed. “Okay. That’s fine.”
We walked up the slight incline to the parking lot through the grass, passing between the pine trees outlining the front of the lot, stepping into the shadows. There weren’t any other cars in the lot, weren’t any other people around. I swallowed. He wouldn’t really hurt me, right?
I didn’t know.
Mason opened the passenger door for me and I climbed in without a fight, jolting in my seat when the door swung shut, my limbs feeling shaky.
He went around the front of the car and climbed into the driver’s side, then put the key in the ignition and turned it, the engine rumbling to life.
Warm air started blowing out of the vents and I wanted to turn it off, make it colder, or open the windows so I could get more oxygen.
But I kept my hands in my lap, nervously watching Mason lock the doors.
Every time I’m with you, I’m scared. Is that what you want?
I think so.
Why do you keep doing this shit to me?
Why do I keep letting you?
How many more of my own lines will I cross for you?
“Who are your professors this semester?” he asked. He was deflecting.
“I don’t really want—”
“Tell me,” he demanded louder, turning to face me, trapping me, making panic grip my chest.
I quickly reached for the door handle, but Mason leaned over faster, covering my hand with his own, stopping me from leaving. My heart started beating harder, dread and fear trickling through my blood. I had nowhere to run.
“Mason, I don’t think it matters who my professors are.”
“It matters.” He leaned forward, capturing my mouth with his own, kissing me. I softened for him, nervous, my pulse wild. “It matters, baby. Tell me.”
For some reason, I really, really didn’t want to tell him. It felt like something awful would happen if I did.
He leaned into my hand harder, pinning it against the door handle.
“You said you would tell me what’s wrong if I came in here with you,” I reminded him, pressing another kiss to his mouth, trying to ignore the discomfort in my fingers. “I want to know.” And I did. I did want to know; I wanted to fix it for him if I could.
I’m trying to be what you need. I know something’s wrong and I’m fucking trying to be here for you. Don’t do this.
“I want to know who your professors are.” He moved his lips down over my jaw, the touch deceptively gentle, almost like he wanted to trick me into giving in to him, to make me forget all the other shit he was doing to me.
But I could feel my pulse throbbing in my fingertips, trapped beneath Mason’s.
“You don’t need to know.”
His body was positioned over mine now, cornering me in my seat. His skin was so hot and the heated air was still coming out of the vents and I felt like I couldn’t breathe.
“I do need to know,” he growled, anger slipping into his tone.
Please don’t do this.
Let me help you. Tell me what’s wrong. Stop trying to force me to give you this answer. It doesn’t matter.
My fingers were getting crushed against the door handle and I couldn’t wrench my hand free, even when I tried. Tears sprung up in my eyes as I glared at Mason, teeth gritted, pain shooting through the bones of my hand. But I didn’t want to tell him it hurt, didn’t want to tell him to stop.
I wanted to survive him.
We weren’t healthy together. The worst sort of pairing. He’d hurt me and I’d let him. I’d even beg him to take it further. I liked the pain.
But this wasn’t like all the other times he’d pushed me, tried to get me to open up to him. I could see it in the darkness of his eyes, feel it in the way he was leaning into my hand harder.
Like he was trying to hurt me.
For real.
Like he was fucking pissed at me.
And I had no idea what I’d done to deserve that.
“Mason. Stop.”
He was kissing me again, but I wasn’t kissing him back, my heart slamming painfully on my ribcage. I tried to turn my head away, to get out from under him. I couldn’t be whoever he needed me to be right now. I needed to breathe. The air in the car kept getting hotter and hotter, suffocating me.
“Stop,” I said louder.
You’re hurting me.
“Give me an answer and I will.”
“I don’t need to tell you shit!” My voice was frantic.
He put more of his weight into the arm holding him up, crunching my hand on the door handle.
The back of my neck was sweating, hairs sticking to my skin.
I had no idea why he was so stuck on this but I wished he’d drop it, wished he would just be honest with me for once.
Wished he would act like he cared about me again.
I twisted my body around, bending my knees up while trying to shove away from him, heavy boots kicking into his torso. My hand was throbbing with pain.
“Get the fuck off of me!”
But he didn’t move a single inch, like he was made of stone. Stronger than any human should’ve been. It struck that same deep chord of fear inside of me that I’d felt the first day, in the ocean.
I stopped fighting.
A cold trickle of primal fear slithered under my skin, an intrinsic feeling of wrongness about him.
He didn’t care about me.
“What is wrong with you?” I whispered, petrified.
He was holding his breath, I noticed now.
I shrank back in my seat, folding my legs to my chest, but he was still too close.
There was something wrong in his head—I knew that.
I knew that the first day I met him and he held his hand over my mouth and nose; I’d known something was wrong inside my head that day, too.
But there was something else.
With Mason, there was always another hidden facet to him. And I’d never been able to figure out what that was. I still couldn’t figure it out.
“What do you think it is?” he asked, not displaying an ounce of softness or concern for me in his eyes, putting more pressure on my hand still.
“I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you, Mason.”
My fingers were starting to go numb.
You’re fucking hurting me.
“You can figure it out. You’re smart.”
No, I’m not. Not when it comes to you. I have no idea who the hell you are.
“Let go of me,” I said through my teeth.
“Give me an answer. Who are your professors this semester?”
His palm was unyielding, pressing into my knuckles too hard, my breaths tripping as my heart beat up in my throat.
“Fuck! Wilder, Larson, Clay, Killshaw!” The words burst out of my mouth, even though I didn’t really want to say them. I just couldn’t keep doing this, couldn’t keep holding my own against him. I couldn’t handle him like this. I wasn’t strong enough.
Mason didn’t move off me right away, my tears finally tipping over my lashes.
And then he let go.
I cradled my hand to my chest, trying to swallow all my screams as I shoved the door open and fell out of the car.
I landed on my knees on the pavement, the gravel sharp even through my jeans.
Snatching my bag off the floorboard, I slammed the door, stalking away from the parking lot, down the slope.
“Dakota!” Mason was right behind me.
I stopped instantly, spinning around to glare at him, fire burning through me, fingers throbbing, hot tears on my cheeks. “Don’t take another fucking step towards me or I’ll scream my head off.”
“Please don’t leave.”
“Fuck you.”
Then I turned and walked away from him, trying to put as much ground between us as possible, wiping the tears from my face. Like on the beach, he didn’t follow me.
But this time, I didn’t want him to.
━━━━━
My pillowcase was soaked through with tears, my phone full of texts from Mason. It was clear he was panicking over the way I’d left him. With my luck, he’d just show up here in the middle of the night again, force his way inside.
I sobbed into my pillow. My hand still hurt and I hated thinking about him doing that do me, hated thinking about the look in his eyes when he was leaning over me. Why would he do that?
It was like some switch had flipped in him, and he became someone else.
Or not.
Maybe he was like this all the fucking time. I didn’t know him.
He knew so much about me, and I still didn’t know anything about him. My chest ached with want. I wanted to know him. I wanted to be with him for real—or at least I thought I did. Now, I wasn’t sure what I wanted.
At least in the past when he hurt me, when he forced me to answer his questions, when he fucked up my mind, I felt like he was doing it because he wanted me.
Even if his methods were twisted and wrong, he was pushing because he wanted to know me.
Because he needed to learn all my secrets, to own everything about me, to hold me in his hands and make me belong to him.
But today didn’t feel like that.
It felt like it wasn’t about me at all. Like he couldn’t care less about how he was treating me; he only cared about getting the answer to his question, and not because he wanted to know my class schedule. Not because it was another piece of me he was uncovering.
It was something he wanted to take for himself. He’d used my pain as leverage to get what he wanted, like I was just a tool, like I didn’t matter to him at all.
And it was making me so confused and upset and anxious.
He’d never been like that before. I didn’t recognize him anymore.
The same darkness was laced through both of us, the same need for obsession and violence, but there were other parts of him, worse parts, things that were darker than I was able to handle on my own.
Naively, I’d believed myself capable of withstanding him; I’d even secretly found pleasure in the idea that I might be the only one who could really understand him, who could match his darkness even if it scared me, even if I sometimes hated it. Because it was in me, too.
But I didn’t believe that anymore.
I didn’t believe anything.