Tears prickle my eyes, and I feel every inch constrict under him, equivalent to being crushed and swallowed by a monstrous wave. “I just—”
“I thought I made myself clear he wouldn’t put his hands on you again.”
My pulse trips. Anger rises in my throat. “You don’t get to tell me who can touch me, Liam!”
The vomiting girl in the stall pops out, stumbling on herself, looking like she got rammed by too many vodka shots. “You guys are intense. Get a room!” And it makes me wonder what kind of relationship she must be into if this altercation calls for a room.
Liam reaches for the door to let her out but still cages me in with his other arm as to make sure this conversation is not over and locks the restroom’s door behind her.
“You can’t lock—” I insist, but his expressionless face is enough for me to know he doesn’t give a shit.
“I can, and I will.” He grunts and brings his hand to my waist.
“You think grief means rubbing into the first vulture? You’re serving it up to him like bait, but you’ve got no clue what world you’re standing on. Pathetic.” He hisses in my face, gliding his fingers down to my collarbone. “That’s not what Joe would want for you.”
I swallow hard at that last sentence, but the lump in my throat stays, feeling his fingers trail down to the straps on my dress and flicking one off, revealing my naked shoulder.
“Why do you even care? You hate me.” I mutter.
His eyes narrow. “Hate?” He challenges airily, leaning closer. “No. Hating requires a fuckload of caring. What I feel is worse.”
My stomach twists at the humiliation, and I sadistically want to dig my fate further with words that come out as quickly as I regret them. “At least Tyler doesn’t look at me like I’m poison.”
“You’re telling me you don’t want poison?” He looks down, towering over me, a handsome disaster waiting to happen. His hand lowers and leaves a trail of heat pinning my waist to the wall, causing a small whimper to escape from me.
“I’m the fucking poison. Me. One that would keep you comatose but never strong enough to kill you, even when you’d beg me to die.”
I want to look away, but I’m not the coward he thinks I am.
“You’re sick.” My tone drops, even though I’m losing the fight in me, I refuse to let him see what lies beneath; sorrow and fucked-up feelings caused by a man making me feel absolutely worthless. Maybe he’s the only one who can truly see me for who I have become.
“Why do you show up just to tear me down?” I hold my ground, but I want to sink into a cavernous abyss.
His hand curls into a fist beside my head, every muscle trembling, while his other hand deftly slides up the thin fabric of my dress, offering no resistance. He hitches up the hem, revealing my skin that tingles under his touch as he squeezes the inside of my thigh possessively. A sharp pain shoots through me, forcing an uninhibited shriek from my lips.
“Because every time I look at you, I think of how Joe will never come back.” He bites out each word.
Tears sting, hot and sudden, rolling down my cheeks as his eyes burn into mine, sharp enough to slice. He lets his forehead fall against the tile so close to my neck, sending goosebumps into my flesh, and I hate how my body responds to him, I hate how I can't help it.
For a split, inexplicable second, I want to reach out, wrap my arms around him, pull him closer and tell him I understand the grief and pain he feels, but then again, I’d be a fool to think I could read a man like him, let alone fix him. Surely, it’s obvious he doesn’t want me to be the glue that puts him back together, and I’d rather drink bleach than waste energy on a deprived soul like his.
Yet, when his shoulders tremble slightly against mine, I feel that soft agony for him again. The brush of his chest, the way his hand cups my face, his scent thick in my lungs feels so intense I can taste it.
My pulse trips faster, harder, betraying me. My breath hitches as my brain screams no, but my body burns yes, and I uncontrollably rock my hips over him. A dizzying shock rolls through me.
“You’re hard.” I lift my chin, reckless on my part. “Guess I affect you more than you’d like to admit.”
For a heartbeat, he doesn’t answer. He emerges back out of my neck, and his eyes flick down to the side. I swallow hard when he presses himself deeper into my stomach. My head falls back from a need, and his mouth curves into something cruel as he’s studying my reaction of shameful desire.
The quiet stillness on his face is worse than his fury, the crushing weight of his stare while relentless knocks on the door cloud my thoughts.
“Don’t flatter yourself.” His hips press harder. “That’s not for you. Half this fucking club could get me hard faster than you. You just happened to be close enough.” The words bang into me with his next thrust over my dress.
“You think you’re special because Joe loved you?” His breath is hot at my ear with knocks on the door getting louder and louder, hitching my breath to a halt.
“You’re not. You’re nothing but a sad little girl who knows how to cry in the right man’s lap. And I don’t get hard for tears. I get hard for control.” He rasps, curling his fist in my hair and tugging it, revealing my chin to his mouth, grazing over my lips.
“I’m hard because I want to destroy you. Because I want to ruin every piece of you Joe thought was worth saving. And that thought…” His hand lifts my leg, opening them wide and wedging between them. “That thought turns me on more than anything else ever could.”
