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“Just tell me so that I can have peace of mind,” I said.
“That’s all you want, isn’t it?” Aurnia asked, staring across the street, refusing to look over at me. “Peace of mind? All you want is to know that I’m not getting needles stabbed into me in some drug den? All you want is to know that I’m not starving on the street? All you want is to know that you gave me a fighting chance? So what? So you can sleep at night, Conor?”
I was getting angry. The way Aurnia’s lips moved when she talked was drawing me to them like a moth to a flame. The way her chest was rising and falling with this pent-up anger I didn’t understand was reminding me of that first night. Her on my tongue. Her around my cock.
“Give me your fucking phone,” I growled.
I was done messing around. I was going to check that fucking phone. Check to make sure Aurnia was safe. And then I was going to go. To leave. To let her fucking go. Because if this went on any longer, there was no way I was ever going to be able to.
Aurnia did not respond. Did not move. When I reached for her phone there in that back pocket where my hands should have been, squeezing her ass, Aurnia jerked suddenly away. Her eyes were aflame as she hissed, “I’ll scream.”
Anger of my own rose in my chest. Was I angry that she was threatening me? Was I angry that this meant that the blocked call was from someone dangerous, someone deadly dangerous? Or was I angry because I knew I wasn’t leaving? Angry because I knew I couldn’t leave? Angry because I knew I didn’t want to leave?
My face was in hers and our heavy breaths were warring against one another as I said, “You’re going to give me that fucking phone, Aurnia.”
We hadn’t been this close in days. We’d been moving around like the other didn’t exist. Like we were in a thick fog and couldn’t even see who was right there beside us. Like we were already forgetting.
I missed this. The speckles of green in her eyes you could only see this close. The thickness of her eyelashes like a tangle of thicket. All thorns. No way out. The little bit of lip balm that glistened on her Cupid’s bow like sweat despite the bitter cold and the cruel wind.
It always made me think of the last time we’d fucked. That time I’d tied her to my bed and worked her body till we were both spent, exhausted. The sheets soaked.
“I’m not a part of your life anymore,” she whispered, lips curling as she noticed my anger melt into lust. “You don’t get to do this anymore.”
“Do what anymore?”
Aurnia stepped closer so that our bodies were tight against one another. I felt her thigh move to my groin. Just enough that it brushed my cock. Just enough that I knew that she knew: it was hard.
“That,” Aurnia said, pulling away just as quickly as she had come close.
My fist collided with the post of the bus stop before I even realised what I was doing. My knuckles were bleeding and splintered and I didn’t even feel them as I stalked down the sidewalk. I could have been leaving a red trail behind me for all I knew. All I knew was anger and desire. I wanted both of them. I wanted to feel both of them. No more numbness. No more cold. I wanted to fucking burn.
“Bus already go?” Mason asked as I stormed back inside Dublin Ink. “I don’t think I saw it go—Conor, you alright, man?”
Rian startled when I grabbed the keys from the hook just beside his head.
“What the—dude, you’re bleeding. What happened? Is Aur—”
The front door slamming shut behind me once more cut off that cursed name. I was vaguely aware of the two of them running out after me onto the sidewalk as I started my motorcycle with a vengeful kick. Teeth grinding. Jaw tense. Knuckles white. Maybe they shouted my name. I don’t goddamn know. I couldn’t hear anything over the roar.
A car screeched to a halt as I whipped into the street without looking. Their horn echoed off the nearby buildings, but I easily outran it. Maybe the driver rolled down his window to call me an asshole. Maybe I didn’t give a fuck.
The city block raced by me and then I was jumping the curb and leaving a long black tire skid on the sidewalk and nearly sending myself over the handlebars as I stopped in front of the bus stop.
“Get on!” I shouted to Aurnia, who either wasn’t afraid or was doing a damn good job hiding it.
I pointed a shaking finger to the sidewalk beside me when she said nothing, moved nothing.
“I’m taking you,” I said over the churning, coughing engine. “Get. On. Now.”
Aurnia moved. But it was only to cross her arms. Set her feet wide. And narrow her eyes at me.
“Get on the fucking bike, Aurnia. Right fucking now,” I growled. “Or else.”
She had the audacity to laugh. To keep her eyes fixed on mine. Flashing. To purse those lips I’d imagined again and again wet around my cockhead.
“Or else what?” Aurnia shouted over the motorcycle which sounded like a roaring river dividing us. “You’ll drag me across the sidewalk in broad daylight? You’ll twist your fingers in my hair and wrench back my neck? You’ll pull out a pack of strip ties from your jacket and lash me to the handlebars? You’ll send us both crashing into some guard rail when I fight you the whole fucking way?”
I glared at her and she glared at me.
“I’m taking the bus,” she said.
“Last chance, Aurnia.”
