You think you know anything about me?”
“I know you’re better than this,” I said quietly.
He turned on me then, his eyes blazing fury. “Don’t you dare judge me, Olivia. I’ve never done that to you.”
“I’m not judging you,” I said. “I just think that if you keep this up, you’ll – ”
“Enough!” he raged. “Stop! You can sit there and give your opinions all you want, but you had no problem staying at my place last night, had no problem using me for the things this club bought.”
My mouth dropped open. “Using you? Is that what you think I’m doing? Using you? If I remember correctly, I wanted to get the hell out of here last night. It was you who made me go home with you, it was you who wouldn’t let me go.”
“What the hell was I supposed to do, Olivia? You cut the shit out of your arms, you almost had sex with me after knowing me for one day! You were obviously confused and lost. What was I supposed to do? I felt sor – ” He cut himself off before he could say it.
But it was too late.
I’d known what he was about to say.
I felt sorry for you.
It hit me like a sucker punch, right in the gut.
In that moment, I hated him with a fiery passion.
I didn’t want anyone’s pity.
“Fuck you,” I spat and then I headed for the door. I didn’t need him. He was just a guy I’d met yesterday, a guy who I’d somehow allowed to work himself into my brain, to invade my mind with his good looks and his cocky attitude. But he was nothing to me. He’d served his purpose. He’d given me Declan’s address.
I had Declan now.
I didn’t need Colt, had never needed him.
He was nothing to me.
My brain laid out the logic in front of me, but my heart argued. I was angry and hurt, the two emotions colliding together and creating a hurricane that threated to sweep me up in its wake.
I needed to get out of there.
I needed to cut.
“Olivia,” Colt said. “Olivia, wait.”
I was closer to the door than he was, but he was faster. He got there first, blocking my way.
“Move,” I said.
“Olivia, I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Then how did you mean it?”
He stayed silent.
“Out of my way,” I said. I pushed by him, but he grabbed my shoulders.
“Where are you going?” he demanded.
“I’m leaving.”
“To go where?”
“Away from you.”
“No.” He shook his head and then his hands were on my face. “You’re not going. I won’t let you.”
I looked up at him, and I couldn’t figure out what the hell was burning inside of me, what this was that I was feeling. He was so confusing, hot and cold, one minute teasing me, the next minute looking like he wanted to kiss me, the next acting like such an asshole that I couldn’t even stand to be around him.
And yet, the whole time, ever since I’d met him, had been this need, simmering beneath the surface. Lust, desire, the need for him to take my body and use it for whatever he wanted.
I took in a breath and my hands balled into fists at my side.
“I don’t want you to hurt yourself,” Colt said. “If you hurt yourself because of me, it would kill me.”
“Then stop pushing me,” I said. “Stop tormenting me, stop teasing me. You’re causing all these things inside of me, Colt, and the only way I know how to handle it, to stop from feeling it, is to cut.”
“Then don’t fight it. Feel it.”
“I can’t. I need to…. I need a release from it.”
His eyes blazed and he reached out and shut the door behind him. He turned the lock, the clicking noise echoing through the room.
“Then let me be your release,” he breathed, and suddenly his body was pressed against mine, turning me around so that my back was up against the door, trapping me.
He took my hands in his, pushed them up over my head and then his mouth collided with mine. His tongue pushed past my lips, claiming me, and I had that familiar feeling I had whenever he was close to me, the feeling of being pushed over an edge, of losing control of everything, of soaring through the air. My legs went weak as he kissed me, my heart thrumming against my ribs.
His hand slid down the side of my body, his fingers skimming over the side of my breast. He