Page 41 of Wreck Me

Which was what I’d been trying to do with her, but her denial and all the lies she’d surrounded herself with had gotten under my skin.

My skin. What the ever-loving fuck? And then I’d veered off my original plan of approach and the knife and the finger-fucking had happened.

While I’d been basking in the dirty memories of every moment of what had gone down, the part that I did regret was losing control over the situation—at least for the most part. I’d still gotten what I’d wanted from her, what I’d set out to get—confirmation of Onyx. She’d even risen to it and shown me facets of her too—the real her. The one we had our eye on.

But she’d come close to usurping me.

Too fucking close.

And now… now there was this.

Anger was gripping me in a biting grip, threatening to ignite a whole lot worse if I couldn’t check it.

The worst part was that I didn’t think I could check it.

Not until the root cause was dealt with.

I didn’t act on emotion.

Or with emotion.

But here it fucking was.

Right here and now.

“Bastian?” I heard Caleb calling to me.

My gaze left the accursed photo and flicked to him. “What?”

He frowned at needing to spell it out. “How do you want to handle this?”

“Not standing around trying to reason with crazy, that’s for sure,” I muttered, spinning and striding to my jacket that was hanging off the stool beside his where I’d hung it earlier to get dinner ready.

As I slid my phone into the pocket and shrugged it on, I reeled off the heating instructions for the food.

“Hell, no,” he said, cutting me off halfway through.

“What?”

“Give me five to get dressed and I’m coming with you.”

“That’s not necessary.”

“It’s either me, or I’ll call Cas in on it.”

I gritted my teeth. “Caleb, there’ll be no paparazzi or media attention to worry about at that venue. Or ending up on social media. Everybody knows the deal.”

“It’s not that.”

I stared at him, somehow hoping that he hadn’t noticed how I was feeling this. It was futile, really, because I hadn’t had the wherewithal to hide it, more concerned with the actual situation itself. And her. Jesus Christ almighty. This was turning into a fucking shitshow of epic proportions.

His hand landed on my shoulder. “You’re reacting.”

“I’m—”

“Intensely,” he insisted, driving it home to me.

I ground my jaw. “Fine. Five minutes and we go together.”

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