What the fuck.
My stomach twisted, bile clawing up my throat.
“Fuck off, Jackson,” I spat, shoving past him. My hands were shaking. I was absolutely terrified of him.
I felt his smile follow me like a knife pressed to my spine. Jackson wasn’t just cruel; I was starting to see that he might actually be a psychopath.
As soon as I reached a clearing between the cabins, Iimmediately launched myself towards the building. I placed both hands on the wood, resting my forehead against its surface.
My breaths came in hot, short bursts. I counted silently in my head.
10… 9…
I was trying to calm myself, but it wasn’t working.
I squeezed my eyes shut, searching for anything remotely calming. Of course, the first thing I heard was Max’s voice in my head.
“You’re okay,”he would have said if he were here.“Nothing will hurt you. I’m here.”
Gradually, my breathing slowed, and calmness rippled through my body. Even as everyone else made me doubt him, he remained my anchor, the beacon of light leading me out of the storm.
But could I trust him? I wanted to believe I could, but now, uncertainty clouded my mind.
Shit.How do you protect yourself from the feeling of being hunted when everyone around you is a predator?
16
MAX
Ihad to head straight to the showers. I couldn’t see straight. I was so pissed off that I couldn’t keep myself together around her. I had almost gone down on her in the nurse’s cabin for fuck’s sake.
I couldn’t shake the heat of her thighs under my hands, the way her breath stuttered, the way she looked at me like she’d let me take her right then and there. She had trusted me naturally, instinctively, like her body was already mine to take.
And that was why I was so fucking attracted to her.
She was eating me alive. She had her hand wrapped around my heart, and would probably take a bite out of it if she could.
This wasn’t just a crush anymore. I had moved beyond attraction. I needed her like air. She was my oxygen. Every single rational thought I had went out the window as soon as I was around her.
Under the water, I tried to wash her off of me and ended up with my fist wrapped around my dick. I thought of her, only her, and I didn’t care what line I was crossing. I came so hard I nearly fell to my knees.
Once I got to our station, I watched her walk towardsme, almost in slow motion, as if she wasn’t detonating me. Her yellow camp shirt was knotted above her waist, black shorts that should’ve been criminal, braids bouncing as if they were designed to murder me one swing at a time.
She smirked, and my chest tightened. She knew. She fucking knew I couldn’t keep my shit together.
“You feeling okay?” I asked, though my voice came out strangled.
“Never better,” she said sweetly, but her eyes were different. She was holding back from me. Something was up.
She leaned close, brushing her fingers over my chest as she adjusted her name tag. She smelled like coconut sunscreen.
Fucking delicious.
“You’re staring.” She glanced at me through her lashes, then averted her eyes.
“Just waiting for the campers.” My jaw clenched. If I admitted the truth, that I was imagining dragging her into the trees and pressing her against the bark until she begged me to stop, I’d never come back from it.
I was losing my damn mind thinking about her. But why was she acting so weird?
