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His hands on my hips go abruptly tight. Slowly, he moves his head back a few inches and meets my eyes. His jaw must be tiring out, considering it keeps flexing repeatedly.
Perhaps this decision will haunt him too, and I am not alone in this.
We are close enough for me to see how his mouth naturally turns up at the corners, to see how his jawline cuts a geometric U-shape, and to note the faint lines near his eyes deepening.
Something likeBrattumbles out of his mouth, barely formed, but when the word registers in my mind, lightning cracks. My teeth are out. I’m smirking, gloriously and savagely, because this is it. Blustering nerves are firing inside me, begging to be released. It’s the kind of pleasure where you don’t think or plan or feel like a puppeteer in charge of your body. No, this moment is primordial. I want to leap into the brawl of this wildness.
Suddenly, I realize what is different with Huan. When you are adjacent-famous, you are a spectacle or revered, but he doesn’t see me in those ways. He calls me a Brat. He sees that fun, greedy, and inappropriate part of me. He sees the pieces locked under a network of calculated hubris. Huan doesn’t think my rebellious yearning is salacious gossip, but just… me.
“Not going to spank me?” I ask boldly again, despite the quiver in my legs.
“Thisis where we’re going to have this conversation?”
“Considering you are kneading my ass, yeah.”
“I’m… method acting.”
“Are the men still watching?” I ask, even though I see from the corner of my eye they aren’t.
He doesn’t glance back. “They are.”
Pinpricks of electricity dot my skin. “We should give them a show so they’ll leave me alone next time.”
His jaw muscles leap harder. “They were bothering you?”
For the sheer fun of it, I bend closer to his ear again, and whisper, “Toxic masculinity.”
“Yes,” he admits without shame. There are some rough exhales before he adds, “You need to let me interfere.”
“How so?”
Exasperated black eyes meet mine. “When being harassed, I’m here for you. Don’t think twice. Direct me as you want. Use me, Komal. Use me to stand between you and anything else in the world you don’t like.Whywon't you use me?”
Use... me...
Now, that is a phrase.
I suck in a breath. “I’m using you right now. But remember, I’m not a?—”
“Hapless, I know. Trust me, you've shown me. I know how exceptional you are at navigating around what people want.”
Zipped in a suit.
“I don’t understand. What are you asking for?”
“In public, I’ll trust you to call on me,” he says. “Like you have now.”
“And… in private?”
“I admit it bothers me when you don’t.”
I study his grimace. Doesn’t he know I can see him too, that I can hear his half-words? I lightly thumb over the side of his mouth. “Let go,” I say.
He blinks.
“Let go,” I demand again.
A frustrated noise comes out of him.
