“Why do you do it? Because you want to push yourself, right? You want to feel that exhilaration?” she says.
“I—”
“Or is it really because this is the only way you feel alive? Because the rest of the time you’re too fucking scared of whatever it is you’re hiding from, to actually feel like you’re living?”
She pokes me in the chest.
“Step away from the fucking edge, Jude,” I snarl. “Or I swear the next move you make will be up onto my shoulder as I carry your city ass down this cliff.”
“Right.” She scoffs. “Because you think you get to decide what’s best for me, when you can’t even admit your real name to me?”
“What the fuck’s that got to do with anything right now?”
I step closer, and she steps back, nearing the edge.
“Tell me the truth.” She jerks her chin up defiantly. “You’re Slade Beaufort, aren’t you? Not hypothetically. The real, stone-cold truth. I want to hear you admit it.”
“You’re fucking crazy,” I snap, inching closer. If she takes another three steps, she’ll be falling off the edge backward. “You think you can force me into telling you stuff that has absolutely nothing to fucking do with you, huh?”
She throws her arms wide. “Maybe. Are you going to tell me? Or are you going to meet me down there?” She jerks her head to the drop behind her.
I grit my teeth, stalling in my movements that are inching me closer to her.
She narrows her eyes. “What’s the highest you’ve ever jumped?”
“Doesn’t matter,” I grit.
“Tell me.”
“You’re not me,” I hiss.
“Not who? Woody? Slade? FuckingBatman?” She laughs, shaking her head. “You know, I do plenty of things on my own. I don’t need your approval. Or anyone else’s.”
“Seems to me like you’re asking for it, though?”
“What?”
“Nothing,” I mutter.
I curse myself internally for letting the ill-timed words slip past my lips. But this woman sparks something in me that makes it impossible not to react.
“No. Go on. You obviously have something to say,” she snaps.
She isn’t going to let it drop. If I say the words with enough conviction to shock her into keeping the fuck still, then I can grab her and prevent the huge damn coronary episode that’s kicking off inside my chest at the sight of her near the edge.
“All right,” I concede, inching a little closer. “You want your father’s approval. You’re still getting over your guilt that you let him down by not wanting to be a surgeon. And you were willing to marry a man who treats you like shit in order to make him proud of you, because your father likes him.”
Her face pales, and she stares at me.
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?” She seethes.
I walk closer, pinning my eyes to hers so damn hard that she doesn’t have time to see what my feet are doing.
“Like I’m the biggest asshole you’ve ever met.”
“Aren’t you? Because right now, it sure seems like you’re trying to be.”
