Chapter 26 The Present #3
She stared at me, lips parted, lashes low. Like she had something to say. I waited for the insult. She swallowed, then shot back, “If I wanted to hear a lecture, I’d call my deadbeat dad.”
I clenched my jaw, shoving past her, shoulders colliding on purpose. Let her chew on that. Every step, her muttering dogged my heels. Too close. Always too fucking close.
“You going to pout all day, Baxter?” she goaded, nearly ramming my back. “Or am I supposed to be scared you’ll finally snap and toss me off a cliff?”
I kept my eyes on the ground, every muscle screaming at me to stop, but pride wouldn’t let me.
Not when she was watching, not when quitting meant she won.
“Trust me. If I wanted to get rid of you, you’d already be down there.
” I hooked my chin at the drop-off to our right.
She glanced at it, face pale, but she didn’t break stride.
Her voice was pure venom. “You’re such a coward, Caiden. All threats, no action. Typical.”
Heat snapped in my chest. I spun, grabbing her by the upper arm and yanking her flush against me. Her hair whipped my mouth. I bared my teeth in a smile that wasn’t a smile.
“You really want to see action, princess?” I shoved her back, just enough to make her stumble over her own feet. She caught herself.
“I forgot. You’re only dangerous on paper.”
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. My head pounded, nerves thrumming like I’d mainlined rage. I wanted to tear into her, rip her down and see what was underneath. But the other half—the hollow half that knew her too well—just wished she’d stop looking at me like I was something worth hating.
So, I trudged on. I could feel her behind me, every shaky breath, every wince.
Eventually, she caught up. Close enough I could hear the catch in her voice when she finally said, “Your dad really fucked you up, didn’t he?”
My hands fisted.
“Fuck off,” I spat.
She didn’t let it go. Of course not. She never fucking did.
“See,” she needled, boots splashing the mud right behind me, “you can’t even talk about him. That’s what makes you weak, Caiden. You keep pretending it didn’t matter.”
“I’m not weak,” I ground out, nose full of the stink of wet rot and mosquito buzz. “But clearly I’m stuck to dead weight. Maybe your dad should have taught you how to survive, instead of how to cry in people’s faces.”
She rolled up beside me, had to practically run to close the gap. “He didn’t teach me shit,” she hissed back, but her breaths stuttered. “Guess I learned to cling to life by watching you hate yours.”
“You going to whine the whole way, or just until you can’t walk?” I shot, eyes never leaving the thin thread of animal trail curling out ahead.
She scowled, hair tangled, jaw set. “I’ll walk circles around you, Baxter. Just give me a minute.” But her hand shook as she said it. She tried to hide it, tucking close to her side, but I saw.
“What, you want a break? Say the word and I’ll carry you.” The disgust flared, but something else twisted with it. A need to see her knocked down, then get back up. To see her crawl. To see her need me.
She flinched at my words, but didn’t look away. “You’d love that. Having me helpless. Makes you feel big, right?”
I grinned, teeth baring in the shadows. “Better than watching you dirt-nap in the forest. If you go down, I’m not digging a hole. I’m leaving you for the vultures.”
She spat leaves from her lips, face gone white as bone. Didn’t slow, just kept moving through the briars like she could out-hate the pain.
Her foot suddenly caught hard on a root and she pitched forward, knees slamming the ground.
Weak. So fucking weak.
I stopped moving, just a tick, watching her shoulders tremor. She tried to push up, dirt streaked over her cheek and knuckles, but her arms barely held her up.
She shivered, eyes glassy, mouth twisted in a sneer like she wanted to spit her last insult and then rot there just to spite me.
Pathetic.
The way she trembled pissed me off. It made every step we’d taken out here look like a mistake carved into bone.
I should’ve let her faceplant and eat mud.
Should’ve walked on, left her to the worms, but instead I crouched down, boots snapping twigs, and grabbed her by the shoulder. Not gentle. Never gentle.
“Get up,” I growled, voice raw and tight in my throat. “You’re not dying here. Not now.”
She flinched, more pride than pain, and tried to slap my hand away. But I had her. Her skin was fever hot under my palm, wet with sweat and river and maybe a little bit of blood still trickling over her wrist.
The closeness made me want to shake her. Or kiss her. Or throw her into the next tree just so I didn’t have to think about how her bones felt so breakable under my grip.
“Don’t touch me,” she hissed, but her words had lost their teeth. They sagged at the end, weak and wet.
I leaned in close, letting her choke on it. “Cry all you want. We’re not stopping.”
She clawed to her knees, hair stuck to her face and leaves gluing her back. I could almost hear her breath scrape in and out, ragged as ripped paper. She got upright, swaying, using the tree as a crutch. Her glare was pure poison.
I smirked. Couldn’t help it.
“Thought you said you could handle pain,” I shot, giving her space but not too much. “Guess we’ve reached the limit.”
She bared her teeth. “I can handle you.”
Doubtful. But I let it slide. The truth was, I needed her to get up, needed her to keep snapping back, because the silence was worse. When she was quiet, it felt like something was hunting us, licking at our heels, waiting for one of us to drop so it could dig in.
We limped forward, push and pull, always the same story.
I let her catch up, slowed my pace. Didn’t say a word about it. I pretended I was still leading. Hated how the woods made it impossible to keep the old masks on.
“Careful,” I snapped over my shoulder, right before a low branch caught her across the face. She yelped. Every time she made that noise, my spine twitched. “Eyes forward, princess. Would hate for a stick to do permanent damage.”
She scowled, thumb swiping blood off her lip. Her mouth had that wrecked, swollen look. God. “Maybe if you’d warn people, but I guess that’s not in your nature, Caiden.”
“Warn you, spoon-feed you, carry you, I don’t see it on my job description.” I grinned at her over my shoulder, all teeth, let her eat that sarcasm. But her glare landed, hot and messy, right in my gut.
The trail twisted, broke. We had to push through ferns, a wall of green shit taller than her. She fumbled one step and her shoe slid in the muck, ankle rolling. She yelped again.
I caught her. Didn’t even think. My grip landed on her hip, hard, and for a split second her body slotted against mine, soft and shaking and filthy.
Fuck. My palm was full of her, fingers digging into her bony side.
For a beat we just stood there, clinging through anger, the world narrowing to the mud and my skin pressed to hers.
“You’re going to wipe out and take me down with you. At least die with some dignity.” I held her one second longer, just to see if she’d fight. She didn’t. Her breathing slowed, turned shallow. I watched her tongue dart out, wetting bloody lips. Couldn’t look away.
“Shit. Um, thanks for catching me.”
If I was smart, I’d shove her off and say something mean to cover my tracks.
Instead, I loosened my grip, but let my hand drag around her hip, thumb tracing just enough to leave a mark. I liked feeling her squirm. She knew it and I knew it. Her skin, even through fabric, felt hot as a fever.
Her hair was wild, cheeks all burning. She squared up with me, eyes blurry-bright and pissed like she wanted to bite my fucking throat out. My heart hammered. The heat between us flared, suffocating. I didn’t back off, not one inch. Just glared down, knowing she’d buckle first. Always did.
I dragged my palm, rough, up the side of her throat. She flinched, breath hissing through her teeth. “What, you scared I’m secretly planning on killing you?” I crooned it low, bending so my face hovered barely an inch from hers.
Her mouth trembled, lips parted. “I’d like to see you try.”
Fuck. The way she looked at me. Hell, nobody looked at me that way. Not even my old man, and he was the king of cruel.
She shoved back, but it just pressed us together, root to rib. I felt the outline of her tits through the thin shirt, her chest fluttering like she was on the verge of screaming. Or something else.
She scraped nails down my forearm. “Get off me, Caiden.”
“Nah,” I whispered, letting the word land cold on her lips. “You’d miss me.”
She rolled her eyes, but the glare was softer, shaky. Her pulse beat against my thumb, crazy-fast. I loosened just enough to let her breathe, but kept her close, locked in my shadow. I didn’t trust myself to let go yet. Didn’t trust her to not spit in my eye, or worse, beg for more.
She tried to twist, but I pinned her. Just long enough to let her feel what I could do if I wanted.
“You always so mouthy when you’re about to eat dirt?” I taunted, letting my grip slide down to the bony point of her hip.
She stilled. I could feel her breathing. Shallow, furious, nothing left to lose. Some part of me wanted to break her completely. The other part? Didn’t know what the fuck it wanted.
She smirked. Lips bloody, nose flaring. “I’ve got more stamina than you, soldier. This what you learned in the Army? Bullying people smaller than you?”
I laughed. Couldn’t help it. The sound came out raw. “You think you’re small? Princess, you’re impossible to miss. Like a siren for suffering. I could spot you in a war zone.”
She kicked out, caught my shin, not hard but enough to sting. “Serves you right,” she bit out, chin stubborn and high even when she could barely stand. Always more venom than blood in her veins.
She limped past, like she wanted to prove she could outpace me. Nothing but bone and spite, that girl. I watched her hips and the mess of her hair swinging wild. Too wild. Too pretty, like she could slice me open if I stared too long.
The bush snagged my shoulder as I followed, wet branches lashing my face. I pushed harder, crowding her back.
She noticed. Could see it in the way her shoulders tensed, in how she threw looks at me over her shoulder like daggers. Didn’t care. I liked the way she bristled when I was close, like she’d claw my eyes out or kiss me just to shut me up.
She didn’t know how close I was to taking her up on both.
I resented every atom of awareness she roused in me.
This wasn’t desire. It was a malfunction: hunger, cold, adrenaline, the desperate reality of danger. My instincts betraying me because she was the only other living soul within reach. Just that.
I repeated it until the words rang empty.
I hated it. I hated it with a depth that bordered on pain. Hated how effortless it was for her to make my guard slip; how she did it by simply existing, by not even noticing the havoc she was waking inside me.
No softness. No longing. No surrender. Wanting her was disaster. The edge of a cliff, the heart of a wildfire I could never smother if it ever caught hold.
She was everything I’d spent years barricading myself against, the wound at the root, the very reason I had built these walls. And now, she was here, shivering and alive at my side, and I could feel my control eroding, fiber by fiber.
I forced my body to stone; forced my mind blank. Forced myself to resurface every reason why caving to this feeling was a death sentence.