that. That it would hurt to be on the receiving end of his displeasure, but it did.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
He was so angry. She could feel it coming off of him in waves. And she could see that he wasn’t entirely reasonable. This was about something else. And she couldn’t quite figure out what. Because she didn’t know anything about him, and he refused to tell her. Because whatever she thought was happening with him, it wasn’t. That much was clear. Because he had forbidden her from asking anything about his past, and she had been sitting there... She was such an idiot.
She was an idiot, and she felt unnerved, with this large, angry man barreling toward her. He stopped, still with a healthy amount of space between them, but she could feel deep, unchecked emotion coming from him.
“Just stick to the cabin, Iris. Stick to what you do. This is my stuff. My business.”
“It’s a building,” she said. “I don’t magically have insight into you that you don’t want me to have because I saw it. You can calm down.”
“Just... I didn’t ask for you to come up here in the first place,” he said. “I didn’t ask for you to bring cookies. I didn’t ask for you to cook me dinner.”
“Well, I did,” she said, taking a step toward him. Anger spiked through her veins.
She didn’t often let herself get angry. She didn’t let herself get angry because it was often pointless. Because what was there to say half the time when life wasn’t fair? When the people around her weren’t fair. Nothing. There was nothing but coping, and she was damn good at that. She was good at putting her head down, good at telling herself that she liked quiet life. That she was fine with the way things were. But she wasn’t fine with this. For the first time in her life she had met a man who interested her in a deep and terrifying way, and he was...infuriating and unknowable.
He was creating desires inside of her that she wasn’t even sure she’d known were there. At least not this strong. And he was... He was pushing her away. And it enraged her that she even had that thought. That she wanted to be something other than away from him. That she felt entitled to anything from him at all. Because he hadn’t opened her chest up and put those feelings inside of her. Because he hadn’t asked for her to feel this connection to him that she did. But she still blamed him.
And this pain that was rioting through her chest felt like his fault too.
Was this what being a teenager was like for most people?
It wasn’t like she didn’t know what it was like to have crushes. It was just...she’d never been able to afford to have her emotions be unchecked. She’d always had to be levelheaded.
Always.
And he made her feel... Not that.
“I cook for you because I’m being nice,” she said, taking a step toward him. “I’m not sure if you know what that looks like. Or what that means.”
“Iris...”
“No. I made you hamburgers. And you...” She moved even closer still, and she could smell him. Musk and man and spicy skin.
His sweat.
It should disgust her. But it didn’t. Instead, it made her want to draw closer. Made her want to... She didn’t even know. She didn’t even have the words for the things that he made her want, and it wasn’t fair.
She suddenly felt desperately, horribly lost.
She’d never had anyone to ask about all this.
About sex and wanting and what you did when a man’s sweat was more attractive than it was repelling.
She’d been the mother figure.
She’d been the one that was supposed to know everything, but she didn’t know anything.
Not about this.
And suddenly, he shifted, and it brought him just that much closer. So close that a whisper separated them. So close that a breath might have closed the distance between their mouths. Heat prickled over her skin, made her skin feel too tight for her body. Her heart thundered, out of control, and she could barely breathe.
Would he kiss her? Was that what was happening?
Would he actually...
She felt weak with it. Terrified. Brave. She wanted to take that additional step. Wanted to close the distance between them. And she also wanted to weep because she didn’t know how.
“I need you to do your job. And that’s it.”
She could feel his heat. His mouth was so close she would only have