Page 6 of Toxic Kiss

“Shut up,” I rasp. My mouth is inches from hers. My thumb brushes bare skin as I mold my body to hers. “You want to save me, Haven? Here’s your chance. Take it. I’m fucking begging for you to save me tonight.”

Her green eyes are wide, defiant, maybe even afraid. But she doesn’t move. Doesn’t push me away. And God help me…I kiss her again.

It’s brutal and hungry. A collision of grief and fury and need. She is my forbidden fruit, and I can’t stop. The longing I feel for her is finally breaking free, and I let it go. There is no fighting it anyway.

When she wraps her arms around my neck and kisses me back, the world tilts again. Everything shifts inside of me like a deadly earthquake. Nothing remains standing.

The bed creaks as I frantically pull my T-shirt off. The heat between us spikes to atomic levels when Haven touches me. I press closer, losing myself in her gentle caresses and the sound of her soft whimpers.

This is wrong. I know it is, but I don’t care. I want her. Haven is mine. The last thought I have before I’m completely lost to the moment is the most fucked-up of all…

I hate that Haven is my rescuer and my ruin, and I’ll never forgive her for it.

chapter

three

“Rock bottom isn’t the end—it’s the place you finally push off from.” - Haven

HAVEN

I don’t open my eyes. I don’t move. I just breathe.

Because if I move, he’ll know I’m awake. And right now, Cyrus Vale, my living nightmare, my tormentor, the boy I swear I hate…is holding me. I can still feel the touch of his lips. My body aches, and yet, if given the choice to refuse…I would do it all over again.

His arm is heavy across my waist, holding me like I’m the only thing keeping him from falling apart. His chest rises and falls against my back, steady now after hours of chaos. And his fingers…God, his fingers. They trace lazy lines up and down my stomach. It’s a featherlight touch, the softest I’ve ever experienced from anyone, let alone him.

It feels like heaven.

I haven’t felt whole in a while. Not since Mom died. Not since Dad remarried and shoved Anita and Cyrus into my life like they could replace what I lost. Not since I lost my best friend, Patrick, twice. Once to Cy and then again in a terrible accident. But in this stolen moment, wrapped in Cy’s heat, my chest doesn’t ache. My soul doesn’t feel displaced from my body.

And the cruelest truth of all? I’ve loved him for years.

Three years of hiding it, three years of swallowing it down while he calls me names and shoves me away. Cyrus turns my insecurities into weapons and carves me up with every smirk as he waltzes girl after girl into his bed. Three years of pretending his voice doesn’t ignite something dangerous in me.

I let him take everything last night. My virginity, my reason, my silence. Because no matter how toxic, no matter how doomed, part of me wanted my first time to be with him. Needed it to be him.

The boy I hate is the only one I’ve ever wanted.

His breath brushes my hair, warm, steady. For one impossible heartbeat, I pretend this is real, that he wants me too. That I’m not just an amusing plaything.

Then his phone buzzes.

Cyrus curses under his breath as he rolls away. My skin goes cold, missing his warmth. The mattress dips, then rises, and I hear the bathroom door click shut across the hall.

I shouldn’t move. I shouldn’t care. But I do. Is it one of the many girls he sneaks in and out of his room? Is it the guys he hangs out with when he gets high, wanting to know where he is? Is it the band looking for him to practice? There are a million possibilities, and the fact that I can’t trust him screams in my ear.

Listening to the doubts or maybe it’s my gut instinct, I slip from the sheets, bare feet silent on the floor, and tiptoe toward the door. I press my ear to the wood as his low voice carries from the bathroom.

“I’m fine, man. Just tired.” A pause. Then his deep and cocky laugh. “Yeah, some random chick begged me to fuck her. You know the type. Unfortunately, she’s still here. The lingerer that wants you to cuddle and shit. Fuck I hate that. Yeah, I’ll kick her out soon, but I may as well fuck her again first.” He laughs.

My stomach drops.

“I don’t care if she heard or not. Let Haven hear me fucking someone else, she’s the one stupid enough to think I could ever like her. Don’t even go there, I fucking hate her, and that is never going to change.”

My breath catches, choking me.

He laughs again. “I know you’re jealous that I get all the pussy, but seriously, I needed that release. I’m feeling much better, and this bitch begged for it, bro. Begged. Didn’t even know what she was doing. All hands and sloppy kissing. Fucking virgins are the worst. They never know what to do, and you have to be so careful with their fragile little hearts, blah, blah, just fuck me already and then go away.”