act like you were thinking about me. You were just trying to figure out Cerys's game." Her voice cracked, and she steadied herself. "Here's the hard truth. It may not be a game. It might be legit. Can you still say you wouldn't ask me to do it?"
He hesitated. Not long, no more than the span of a few heartbeats. But he hesitated, and they both knew it.
The look on his face, hurt and confused, floored her. He still didn't understand, but he would, eventually. He'd know why. But that didn't help as she stood there, collar in hand. Her chest actually ached, which was fucking stupid.
Hearts didn't literally break.
She held out the collar. "Take it. Please."
"No." A storm was brewing behind his eyes, one that would swallow the pain and unleash something far more dangerous. "Not unless you're planning to replace it with my ink."
It hurt so much more, having a glimpse of something perfect only to realize it couldn't exist, that it fell apart when times got hard. "I have to find someplace, but I'll go." Yet another way she'd betrayed herself. It had been years since she'd kept up a place outside the compound, somewhere to go if things went bad. "If you can give me a few days--"
"No." He advanced on her, and she could hear the thunder. "This isn't how it ends. This isn't what kills us. Not stupid, fucking words."
"What else could it be?" They'd always lived loud, almost violently. Screaming and shouting. It made sense for their relationship to die quietly.
He stopped toe-to-toe with her, looming over her, taking up all the air, all the light. "Not this. Not her."
"Dallas..." All she had left were harsh words, damning ones, and she had to soften them by lifting her hand to his cheek. "It wasn't her."
Pain flashed across his face, jagged as lightning as the storm broke.
And he kissed her.
No, not a kiss. Nothing as gentle as that. His fingers snagged in her hair, yanking her head back as his mouth came down, forceful and desperate. Bruising.
He'd always touched her with care, even when he gave it to her rough, but not now. This wasn't desire but punishment, not need but some twisted version of it.
Not possession but confinement.
Lex let her hands hang by her sides, and the collar fell to the floor. No matter what, she couldn't fight. A dark thread of longing was already unfurling in her belly, and if she fought him, it would all get tangled up in sex.
His teeth dug into her lip, and he growled. "Gonna pretend you don't feel it? You don't feel us?"
Of course she did. She'd felt it the moment she first laid eyes on him, the zing of awareness that hadn't faded over time but deepened into something inescapable, and strong enough to tear them both to shreds.
She shuddered and gripped his shirt, clenching her fingers in the fabric. "This part isn't the problem."
"But this part is so good." He backed her toward the wall, every step pushing her deeper into his room, deeper into him. "Worth fighting through the rest of it. What happened to trusting me?"
She'd given it all to him, and he'd let her down. Because there was a flip side to that trust, an implicit promise that if she handed him her heart, he'd always put her first. And he hadn't.
"I'll hate both of us," she whispered. "Can't you see that? If I keep letting you do these things to me without standing up for myself, it won't matter. There won't be enough of me left to love you."
Her back thumped against the wall. He was smothering her. So warm, so strong, so familiar. "So stand up for yourself. Just don't walk away."
She put her hands flat on his chest and pushed. "Stop it."
"That's it." He slapped his hands to the wall on either side of her head. "Stand up to me."
She'd finally given in, opened herself. Trusted him. "Not like this, Dallas."
"Fucking fight me, Lex."
"I shouldn't have to!" Shaking, she ducked under his arm.
She only made it two steps before his fingers closed around her shoulder. Desperation drove her to slap away his hand, then dive for one of the knives on the floor.
His expression hardened as she held the blade in front of her. Furrowed brow, compressed lips, narrowed eyes--but she couldn't tell what was going on behind that dark gaze. "Would you stab me, Lex?"
"Only if you make me."
His lips twisted into a terrible smile. "Good. Get