: Chapter 23

The car parks and I hear him slam the door shut, followed by feet shuffling towards me.

He grabs my wrist, spinning me to face him. “Let’s go. You’re not walking home in this rain.”

“Let me go, you asshole!” I yell, attempting to pull my wrist out of his firm grasp.

He doesn’t let go. He pulls me to the car where I place my hands against his chest, pushing back away from him any way I can. We’re wrestling against each other as the rain pours down on us, my hair now drenched as he presses his hips against mine, pinning me in place.

“Get in the fucking car!” he yells, slamming his fist against the top.

His voice startles me, and I pause in place, taking in his angry demeanor.

“No! Leave me alone!”

He opens the back door, wrapping an arm around my waist as he throws me on the seat. I bounce with a grunt at the force he uses. Brushing the wet strands of hair back out of my face, I turned to see him in the back alongside me.

“What are you doing?!” I attempt to shove him back, the anger coursing through me, but he quickly grabs my wrists, holding me against him.

“You don’t listen!” he growls.

“Don’t you touch me! I hate you!” I scream, feeling overwhelmed and upset at the fact that he’s overpowering me.

He grabs my upper arms and pulls me closer to him, tightening his jaw at my words. The look in his eyes is wild. The rain has his hair piled all over the place while water drips from his locks. His toned arms are wet and slick, and his shirt is clinging to every mound of muscle underneath it.

The emotions are bubbling over. All the confusion, all the lust, all the embarrassment, the regret over the past few weeks…it’s all turning into rage. The words seem to affect him, so I say them again.

“I hate you! I fucking hate you. You’re sick! All that stuff you were doing in there, all this stuff these past few days. For what?! You said it means nothing to you! Quit with the mind games! Leave me alone!” I yell into his face, beating my forearms against his chest.

And I do. I hate him for how he makes me feel. I hate that life isn’t simple anymore. I hate that he is the only one who can set me on fire, and I hate that he makes me truly look at myself for the person I’ve become. I hate that I feel raw and vulnerable around him.

“You hate how I make you feel. You hate how you can’t stop thinking about me. You hate that the thought of me with someone else drives you wild, but you feel like you have no right to own that. Quit lying to me,” he says in a firm tone, shaking my arms as he speaks.

I lift my chin to him in defiance against all these truths. “It’s you I hate.”

His dark eyes smolder through me. He isn’t put off by my rage. If anything, it seems to only bring more intensity to the situation. His mouth is open and his breathing is wild and out of control, matching mine.

“Yeah? Show me how much you fucking hate me,” he grimaces, grabbing the loopholes of my jeans and pulling me so I slip down, my back now on the seat.

“Stop it, Hawke!” I yell.

He pauses for a minute, trying to catch his breath. There’s a deep, dark pain in his eyes. He slowly leans forward above me, arms bracing his dripping frame.

“Tell me you wish we never fucked.” He growls as his hand travels, wrapping tightly around the back of my neck, forcing me to look at him.

I know what he’s about to do and I can’t stop it. He’s making me face what I don’t want to face. Reality.

I wince my eyes tightly and he squeezes his hand, forcing them open. “Tell me you hate how I make you feel.”

The forceful aggression that’s oozing out of him has my head spinning. I don’t want to like it, but something deep within me craves him. I want him to possess me the way that he naturally does.

His hands travel from my neck to my chest and further down my abdomen as his skilled fingers pop open the button to my jeans.

“Hawke.” My voice is totally breathy and uncontrollable as I lift my hips to allow the pants to come off.

I know what’s happening and I don’t want it to stop. I want to put up this fight, to deny what I’m feeling, but I can’t anymore. I crave him in all the ways I wish I didn’t.

He places his hand over my underwear, rubbing the spot that aches the most. “You want this. I know you do. You need me. Tell me.”

“No. I shouldn’t do this anymore. Not with you. Not like this.” I moan, pushing his hand away from me.

He sits back on his heels and slams the seat of the car with the back of his hand, screaming out, “You don’t know what you want!”

He’s right, I’m attempting this game of acting like I don’t know, when at the moment, all I want is for him to keep pushing me over the edge, to send me off into the deep end, because I know if he pushes, I’ll willingly go. If he doesn’t, I may stay locked up in this prison of my own doing forever.

“Goddammit Cole, you drive me fucking mad!” He pulls at the roots of his hair, dragging his hands down his face. “Tell me you didn’t want to break something in there watching me with her. Tell me it didn’t drive you crazy.”

“Hawke.” I prop myself up on an elbow, grabbing his shirt.

He was doing all of that just to hurt me like I hurt him every day with Patrick.

“You know you need this. I know you do because I need it too.”

He presses himself back on me and begins kissing the side of my neck.

“Hawke,” I moan breathlessly, and I can’t figure out if I’m trying to stop this or not anymore.

“Kiss me,” he demands, grabbing the side of my neck.

He presses his mouth to mine, and I wince in pain. It’s a pain of knowing he’s what I need. I’m in total denial and losing the fight with each second that passes.

“Kiss me, dammit,” he says against my mouth before plunging his tongue between my lips.

He groans deeply as he presses his erection into me through his jeans. His kiss is desperate. He’s aching for me as our tongues touch. His hands run over every curve of my face, our breaths meeting each other in the air as we fall wildly, madly into this cycle. I’m his drug, and his fix is finally getting met. The kiss intensifies and I’m left moaning at his departure. I want more. I need more.

He straightens, looking down at me with heat in his gaze, quickly unbuckling his pants, pulling them down just enough to expose himself. He’s hard and ready for me. My mouth drops open at the sight, eyes suddenly heavy with lust. The excitement brewing inside me feels like it’s about to pool over. I close my eyes, swallowing down any type of regret that may follow this, and just fall deeper and deeper into the darkness with him.

He tears open a condom with his teeth before sheathing himself, then grabs the front of my underwear, roughly pulling it to the side before lining himself with my entrance and forcefully pushing inside of me.

“Oh, God.” I moan at the sudden fullness, throwing my head back against the seat of the car, his eyes on me.

He pulls back, pressing his lips against mine. He’s aggressive in his motions. His short, quick breaths, making it seem as though none of this is in his control.

“Lie to me, Cole. Tell me you hate me.” A deep groan leaves his throat, staring down while pulling almost all the way out of me, leaving just the tip of him inside.

My hand grips the wet shirt on his back, clawing for it, needing what he’s taking away. I hate how much I need him. I hate how he drives me wild with passion. I hate that somewhere, some deep place inside of me, wasn’t fulfilled until him.

“I hate you.” I gasp as he drives back into me. “Oh, I hate you so much.”

He grabs a handful of my hair from the back, pulling it firmly, forcing me to look up at him while he thrusts into me harder and harder. I spread my thighs to accommodate his body, needing to feel him as deep as I possibly can.

“Oh, fuck,” he rasps, pressing most of his weight on me against the back seat of the car.

He feels so good inside me again. Slick, hot, and hard, sliding in and out of my wetness. My entire body ignites with a fire that I’ve been missing. Shock waves course through me, lighting every nerve ending in a matter of seconds. There’s no replacing this irreparable sensation. He’s an enigma, the only problem worth solving to me. He’s everything I hate admitting to myself that I need.

“Tell me you missed this,” he says in a pleading tone that almost makes my heart ache.

I know how much he needed me, just by the way his eyes are barring through my soul.

Gasping at his force, I try to form words. Words that fall breathlessly from my lips. “I missed it. I missed it so much.”

I hold him to me, gripping the hair at the back of his head with my fingers. It’s as if we can’t physically get close enough. The both of us grasping at each other, pulling one another in, to connect at a level that is more than physically possible.

“Fuck, I need you.” He groans before he presses his lips firmly against mine.

He kisses me like I’m the only thing keeping him here. The only lifeline keeping him alive. My tongue against his soothes him in a way no drink, no drug, no other woman ever could.

“I need you, Cameron.” I pull back, touching his face, making sure the words reach him.

The truth is there for him. I can’t fight it anymore. I won’t deny this to myself. I can’t. There has to be more to this feeling of undeniable need. It’s not all lust.

His eyes search mine desperately, as if trying to determine the validity of this truth.

His forehead presses against mine as we continue to stare into each other, reaching our destination together. I scream out, clawing the back of his neck with one hand, the other gripping his shirt in my fist. I come around him, losing myself in the moment just before he releases with a deep guttural groan. We breathe heavily together, basking in the aftermath of our connection.

It’s then I realize how reckless we were. How easy it was to fall back into this cycle of madness that’s grown between us. I’m literally losing myself in him and the way I can’t refuse this.

His face finds mine, his mouth still parted as he looks on the verge of passing out.

“Cole…” he says breathlessly, searching my eyes for regret, worried that what happened will end like last time.

But, I can’t deny what I’m feeling anymore. He’s forced me to face it and there’s no going back. I reach up, grabbing the back of his hair, and pull his face to mine. I want more. I need more. He’s the drug I never knew I needed. The high I never want to come down from. I’ve fallen. Deeply, irreversibly so.

And we kiss. We kiss while still connected. We kiss until our lips are swollen and used. His hands gently cup my face, memorizing the curve of my cheekbones, the feeling of my nose against his, the angle of my jaw.

The car is now completely fogged up as our breathing slowly regulates. He finally pulls out of me, fixing himself up as I do the same, struggling to put my wet pants back on.

Why can’t we stop this? It’s so irresponsible, yet feels so necessary. I can’t let him go.

Just as I’m falling back to the same routine of getting in my head, he turns to the back window and begins writing something backwards on the fogged-up glass. My brows knit together as I attempt to read it.

‘We just fucked.’

He turns to face me, a surprising smirk playing on his lips as I playfully gasp at his crudeness. He opens the door, getting out of the back seat and holds a hand out for me. I take his hand as our eyes connect. There’s a softness there, a realization. So much seems to have changed in a matter of minutes between us.

One minute we’re screaming at each other in the rain, the next minute we’re wildly fucking in the car, the next we’re playful.

I don’t know what happens next. There’s no manual for this type of situation. We’re mindlessly floating through time and space, recklessly doing whatever we want, no matter who it hurts, no matter how horrible it seems because it feels right to us. It’s a terrifying realization.

After getting back into the car, Hawke reaches over and grabs for my hand, pulling it onto his lap. He turns to me, bringing the hand to his lips and kissing each of my knuckles softly. The look in his eyes, piercing and serious, filled with nothing but the weight of his emotions. There’s still so much beneath that exterior, but by finally admitting my truth to him, I’ve gotten under that first seemingly indestructible layer.

I suck in a breath at the unexpected and sweet gesture.

We make the trip back home as I notice a new look in his eyes. A determined look that wasn’t there before. He seems so confident and clear all of a sudden, as if now he knows exactly what he wants. The thought of it bewilders me. How can you feel so deeply for the one with all the secrets?

We continue down our dark road together, sinking further into the shadows of our desires, all while the fogged-up ‘we just fucked’ car cruises through this small, intolerant town.