Page 170 of Make Me Mean It

All I can hear is my own breathing and the rush of blood in my ears.

All I can see is Connor’s face when Marcus said it.

Warm hole.

Like that’s what Connor was to me.

Like I didn’t fucking fall apart walking away from him.

“Fuck, Marcus!”

Hands grab at Marcus’s shoulder, trying to wrench him backwards.

“Get off him.”

Marcus fights against him for another second and I almost go straight back in, my hands already curling into fists again, but Connor gets enough of a grip to drag him away and the space opens between us.

I stumble back, sucking air into lungs that don’t seem to want it. My mouth throbs with every beat of my pulse and I swipe my tongue over my bottom lip before immediately hissing at the sting.

Blood.

Fucking brilliant.

I spit onto the ice, red splattering across the white, and drag the back of my hand across my mouth.

“Fuck this.”

My fingers shove through my hair, catching roughly in the strands as I force myself to breathe, and then I make the mistake of looking up.

Straight at Connor.

He looks fucking wrecked.

His face has lost most of its colour beneath the flush still staining his cheeks, his eyes too wide as they move over me, catching on my mouth, the blood, my hands.

Then he’s moving.

I should step back.

I know I should.

But Connor comes closer and my body does what it always fucking does around him.

Nothing.

I just stand there and let him.

His hand lifts carefully between us, almost hesitant, before his thumb brushes beneath my split lip. It catches against my ring, barely touching me, and my breath fucking stutters anyway.

His eyes lift to mine and there’s so much guilt in them that something inside my chest twists painfully.

“Theo—”

I jerk away before he can finish.

“Just don’t.”

It cracks despite how hard I try to keep it steady.