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“You don’t get to ask questions here, I do,” I said, my chest rising and falling with hard, heavy breaths. Not because I had to hurry to catch up to him, but because I was so ticked off at him. It was only when he turned around and gave me a hard look that I asked, “What the hell was that?”
The trees over our heads blocked out much of the moonlight, but enough of it shined through to illuminate the hard features on his face. He appeared, in that moment, dangerous. “That’s your question?” Like always, he sounded unimpressed.
I folded my arms over my chest. “Yes, it is.”
Five feet sat between us, though not for long, because before he said another word, he stepped toward me, angling his head like he was a dog hearing something for the first time, curious and interested. The unforgiving expression on his face made it very hard to stand there, still, while he approached me so aggressively.
“You know what it was,” Brett whispered. For once, he didn’t wear his signature empty smile. Right now, he sneered at me, almost like he was trying to intimidate me and get me to go away.
And, hey, if I wasn’t so riled up, maybe I would tuck my tail between my legs and leave him alone, but I was pissed. So pissed I saw red.
“You had no right to do that,” I told him, holding my ground even though he now stood inches away, towering over me like a giant. I had to tilt my head back to hold his stare. “You had no right to pretend to be my boyfriend and kiss me—”
His voice came out low, “I didn’t hear you complain about it. In fact, you didn’t try to push me away at all—”
“Just because I didn’t push you away doesn’t mean I was okay with it!” The words were said in a rush, and for reasons unknown to Brett, I felt them in my soul. My arms fell to my sides, and I took a step backward, angling my face down and letting my hair hide my face.
“Just because someone doesn’t say no doesn’t mean they want it,” I added in a whisper, an invisible weight suddenly pushing against my chest, a pressure that made me want to curl up in a ball and stop existing.
Brett, never the one for personal space, matched my step back with one of his own forward, not letting me move away from him. “Your ex had no right to get that close to you,” he told me.
“And you did?”
“I had to let him know he couldn’t sweep back into your life,” he shot back, “and besides, if he is your mysterious stalker, seeing you with me will get him riled up enough to make another move. Isn’t that what you want?”
I didn’t say anything. I’d long since stopped knowing what I wanted.
“And don’t flatter yourself, Charlie,” Brett’s voice turned acidic. “You’re not exactly my type. I tend to go for women who actually look like women and not ones that still need to go through puberty—”
“You are cruel,” I whispered, hating that his words stung me so much.
“I’m a killer. What’d you expect?” Brett inched closer, and I tried to move away from him, but I backed myself right up against a tree, and he took advantage of that by placing his hands on either side of me on the tree, blocking out any escape route. “You want me to kill for you, not have tea parties.”
Even though I wasn’t in the superior position, I tried to puff myself up. I met his intimidating stare and said the only comeback I could come up with: “I don’t even like tea.”
“Then who’s the real monster here? Me or you?”
His deadpanned response almost made me smile. Almost. “I mean it, Brett. You had no right to do any of that. I didn’t need your help or whatever you think that was. I had everything under control.”
“Really? Because from where I was, it looked like you were trying to leave, and your ex wouldn’t let you. You really wanted me to stand back and let him act like he’s still owed your time?” The venom in his tone had dissipated, his voice no longer jarring and brutal. “You don’t owe him anything.”
“I know that,” I whispered. “But I definitely didn’t need you to kiss me, Brett.”
“Don’t you think your stalker will be pushed into action if he thinks you’re unavailable? Especially if it’s that asshole.” Brett’s fingers dug into the bark of the tree, the sounds of splintering wood filling my ears. “I hope it is. I want to kill him for hurting you.”
My gaze fell to Brett’s chest, his words filling me with a bizarre sense of peace. I… believed him, as weird as that was—which was just stupid. So, so stupid. “You don’t even know what happened,” I whispered.
“It’s obvious he hurt you. I don’t need to know anything else.”
That got me to sharply look up at his face. “Why do you care if he hurt me or not?”
One of Brett’s hands left the bark of the tree, and before I knew what he was doing, he moved that hand to my cheek, gently tucking my hair behind my ear to get it away from my face. His body shifted, parts of him moving closer. He was practically pinning me to the tree, his body inescapable. His head loomed over me, his hand lingering on my cheek.
“Your eyes are always so sad,” he told me in a hushed whisper. “I didn’t understand what you meant when you said my smile doesn’t reach my eyes, not until I saw you do the same. It’s like you’re a sad little kitten, lost and alone. You might puff up and hiss and swat, but how much damage could you really do? Those eyes of yours are asking for help.”
My breath caught in my lungs. As much as I wanted to argue with him and tell him that I was not a sad little kitten, I couldn’t seem to find my voice. I couldn’t seem to do much of anything besides stand there and lose myself to the shadows in his eyes.
“So, yes, I want to kill Zak. Even if your mystery man isn’t him, I still want to hurt him because of how he hurt you,” Brett spoke, letting out a hard, long breath. The hand on my cheek fell to my jaw, sweeping down to my neck, and it curled around it snugly. Not hard enough to choke, but firm enough to be felt when I swallowed.
