Chapter 7 Olivia
OLIVIA
“Let go of me,” I hissed. I wasn’t normally so moody, but there were so many things out of my control that were weaseling themselves into my life that I couldn’t catch a break.
And I needed one.
Desperately.
“Olivia,” Weston said in a stern tone. I was tired of hearing it, tired of the tightness that pinched off each of his syllables until he was speaking the next. He couldn’t be vulnerable for longer than a second, could he? He couldn’t—
“Sit back down.”
A mirthless laugh left me as I wrenched my hand out of his grip. Like hell would I sit and have a deep conversation with him when he made my mind hurt, my heart. I wouldn’t have been surprised if my hands had blisters on them from how hard I clung to my side of the rope.
The problem was that Weston was relentless, and I only had so much fight in me.
So, I was done. I was walking away. I was praying that someone would come for us soon and save me from this hell I walked into but wanted no part of.
“Absolutely not.”
He said my name as my hand curled around the door handle and pulled it open a crack.
“Olivia. Jesus, why are you being so difficult?” I imagined him pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation, but I didn’t give a single damn. For all I endured tonight, he deserved the minor inconvenience of my attitude.
“Just…leave me alone,” I said as I rounded out into the main area of the break room.
It looked the same as it did before, and when I glanced over at the windows, rain droplets slid down the glass.
Though, if there was one small win, it was that it slowed down a bit, again.
It wasn’t coming down in sheets but a trickle that indicated the storm could’ve made a turn for a simple rain shower.
Weston was hot on my tail, barreling out with me. His presence was all-consuming. Right in front of me even though I had my back turned to him. He wasn’t going to get the emotion on my face. He was getting nothing from me.
At least, that’s what I told myself as I made it over to the cabinet where the medicine was again. That dull ache was slowly turning into something more, thanks to the tension that cinched around my temples and skull.
“Running away when people are talking to you is a real problem,” he had the nerve to say as I opened the cabinet door. His warmth beckoned me from behind. He couldn’t have been more than a few feet away. One glance over my shoulder would tell me that, I just knew it.
I grabbed the headache reliever, popped the cap, and swallowed down one more pill.
When I didn’t respond, Weston’s shoes squeaked against the tile right behind me. “Christ, you’re real mature.”
“I’m not having a conversation with you. I’m done with the bickering. I’m done with all the shit that comes out of your mouth that cuts. Please, do us both a favor and pretend like I’m not even here.”
“I’m not doing that,” he said.
“Then prepare to be ignored,” I said simply, losing the fight in me to battle on.
“I’m not doing that, either.”
I rolled my eyes and turned to head back to my seat by the table. I didn’t get very far before fingers curled around my elbow and spun me back around. I ground my teeth into my cheek and came face-to-face with the man that made my blood boil. That made me feel things that I couldn’t understand.
“Look at me,” Weston clipped out, a growly sound coming from the back of his throat.
“No thank you.”
I tried to get him to drop his hand on me—for a second time—but his grasp grew into a gentle tightness. And then, he crowded my space and angled me until my back was firmly pressed into the edge of the counter.
My body froze. I couldn’t move. I was afraid if I did, that I’d have to deal with the actuality of what was happening. I wasn’t sure I had the mental capacity to do that. That I was capable of dealing with the truth, which was that Weston’s body was pressed firmly against mine.
The first thing I heard was his sharp intake of breath. It ignited a fiery sensation in my stomach that dove south like a hawk in flight snatching up its prey.
I was the hawk and the prey.
“Wes—”
“Don’t speak,” he hissed in a whisper of a voice, the damn tone sending chills down my back. I broke out in a sweat, and when both of his hands settled on either side of my waist, I forgot how to breathe. My body only recognized one thing, and that was the very large man in front of me.
He moved in closer, even though he was already right there.
My heated skin grew that much hotter. That much more desperate to be touched because it had been at least two weeks since Lennon and I were intimate.
I wasn’t too shy to admit that I had needs.
That I had a very healthy appetite for affection and intimacy.
A growly sigh left him before one of his hands lifted from my waist and climbed my arm to my shoulder, his thumb resting next to the thick piece of fabric that covered me there.
When he dragged his finger underneath it, pushing it down my arm a little, my nipple peaked, rubbing against the soft fabric of the built-in bra.
I swallowed hard.
I didn’t know what was happening.
And yet, my head tilted back the slightest bit, almost like it was asking for more.
I hated that it was so dark. That I couldn’t see the look on his face entirely.
I mean, the flashlight was back on and helped, but it wasn’t enough.
I was missing this moment and that expression that I had no doubt would shatter me to pieces.
Because the way he held onto me… It was like he owned me.
And hell, maybe he did.
I didn’t dare speak, too afraid of ruining the moment. But also because I lacked the strength. I also didn’t know what I could possibly say to change the course we already started down.
My hands fell to my sides. I was too nervous to give back what he was giving me—touch. But those fingers on his opposite hand tickled up my other arm until it found the sleeve resting on my shoulder.
“You want to know why I’ve acted the way I have?
” Weston whispered in a rough voice. I swallowed again—I was doing a lot of that—but couldn’t force the word out of me.
Yes. He leaned in until his feverish breath fanned against my cheek.
“If you want to know the answer, then you’re going to have to give me that voice, Olivia.
So, I’m going to say it one more time—do you want to know why I’ve acted like the biggest asshole on the goddamn planet when it comes to you? ”
My stomach fluttered. “Y-Yes,” I said before murmuring, “I want to know.”
It was what I was trying to figure out all night.
His breath grew closer, skimming down my cheek and sinking into the skin where his thumb brushed.
“I saw you first,” he whispered. “I saw you first, but he was the one who was lucky enough to get a chance with you. The one who’s kissed your skin.
” His mouth dropped to the underside of my jaw and pressed a kiss to me, and then I really did tip my head back.
Because, God, I wanted more.
But no, I should have pushed him away.
My body and mind were at war with each other, and because of it, I couldn’t come up with a solution, an answer, or the right way to go about this.
That sweet spot between my legs was on fire in the most delicious way. It was begging me to touch it. Begging him to touch it. The little voice that told me to stop whatever was happening faded away. As much as I should have listened, I didn’t want to.
I ached to be bold, daring, wanted.
He pulled one of the sleeves of my dress free, letting it loosely dangle down my arm, and pressed a kiss lower, this time swirling his tongue against me. “The one who’s tasted you.”
“I don’t—”
“Shhh,” he hummed, grabbing hold of the back of my neck and keeping it steady. His wet tongue slid from the front of my neck, up the center of it, and stopped before reaching my bottom lip.
I managed to say his name, except it came out like more of a whimper. “Weston.”
“His name has never sounded as good on your lips as mine. If you thrive off the truth, that’s about as honest as it gets, sweetheart.”
My eyes fluttered shut. I loved the way he held me to him. As much as he used me as a dartboard, I felt protected in his arms. I felt…important. It was something I couldn’t rationalize while his hands were on me.
“You were meant to be mine. From the first second I saw those pretty fucking green eyes. From the second you walked into Taylors Security in that godforsaken flowery dress that swished around your legs, those fuck-me pumps clasped tightly around your delicate little ankles.”
“So then why—”
“Quiet, Olivia. I’m not done explaining myself.”
Arousal looped through me at his demand to stay silent.
Something about it drove me closer to an edge I didn’t even know existed, yet there it was, reaching for me and begging for me to put my hand in its own.
It didn’t help that Weston’s voice was low or that he smelled so good.
Like clean linen, aftershave, and regret.
“Once Lennon had his sights set on you, I knew I’d never be able to have you.”
My heart hurt knowing that he pushed me out of his mind for so long. That he didn’t make an attempt to be with me before his brother did. That, if I would have paid attention to this undeniable pull, I could have possibly shared intimate moments with him, instead.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked quietly. “Why didn’t you express what you felt for me?”
He pressed a soft kiss to the corner of my mouth.
“Because I didn’t want to take something as beautiful as you away from my little brother.
I couldn’t do it then, but I’m so goddamn conflicted every time I look at you now.
As much as I’ve claimed you in my mind, I know it’ll never be that way in reality. ”
I lifted my hands then and found his neck.
I trailed my fingers up his face and ran them over his scruff.
The way it scratched at my palms incited more from that spot between my legs.
I traced the outline of his lips. Ones that could spit mean truths.
But also made me want something bad, something so forbidden that it had the potential to wreck us both.
I leaned forward, that magnetism between us so strong I couldn’t get away.
I wanted to do to him what he did to me.
I thought about it for one more second before pushing down the guilt that would consume me later.
It was only us in this dark room, and it would only ever be us here.
No one else had the opportunity of intruding.
No one could encroach on our space as rain pinged down on the metal roof above us.
I continued outlining his thick, full lips, taking my time and going agonizingly slow. Not just for him but for me, too. I loved the draw out. The tension that consumed a person until they had no other option but to snap.
And maybe I’d regret it when it happened, but I realized that was exactly what I wanted.
For Weston to break under the pressure of what I did to him.
Because that’s what he did to me so many damn times.
He deserved to know what it felt like. To lose himself to someone who was irreverent, irredeemable, and downright irritating.
He groaned beneath my touch, that sound reverberating deep in his chest. His hands fell to my waist, his fingers tightening around my dress.
“You’re bad for me,” he murmured. “So fucking terrible.”
“But you like that,” I said so low he could barely hear me. “Don’t you?”
“You have no idea how much I like every little detail about you. From your smart damn mouth to the way you terrorize me by wearing these dresses to work three times a fucking week.” He let out a heavy breath.
“You’re the kind of woman that has the power to make me the man I should be or completely destroy me. ”
That was interesting because… “I’m not that kind of woman for your brother,” I murmured.
“That’s because he’s an idiot who has his head stuck so far up his ass that his only guidance system is whether or not his dick is hard.”
“We could say the same about you. The head up the ass thing.”
“We could,” he responded without missing a beat. “How many years do you suppose I’ll spend in Hell if I take that pretty mouth of yours that doesn’t belong to me and taste how sweet that tongue is?”
My heart hiccuped. Goosebumps pebbled across my arms, and a new, satisfying kind of heat surged south. “Something tells me you don’t really care what your sentence will be.”
His words came out sharper. “I do care,” he said. “But the thing is—I’m always thinking, siding with logic, and assessing situations and circumstances. For once, I don’t want to do any of those things. Not right now, and definitely not with you right in front of me.”