Page 44 of Clubs

“What do you want me to do? Write you a fucking sonnet? Scream from the rooftops that you mean everything to me?” Turning back out the door, she yelled, “I may be emotionally unavailable, but apparently, I’m great in the sack! Apparently, that’s all I give Declan! Just so everybody knows!”

“Are you five?” I asked. “We can’t have a serious conversation without you —”

“And I’m crazy!” she yelled. “I’m a psychopath! Or maybe, sociopath.” She turned back to look at me. “Which one was it again?” She turned back outside. “It doesn’t matter. Apparently, Declan is the perfect one in this relationship, and I’m a failure! I’m a failure for saving his ass, and sucking his dick like a champ, and doing everything—”

Grabbing her by the waist and hauling her away from the door, I slammed it shut. “I can’t stand you.”

“Somehow, I’m the bad guy,” she said.

Backing her into the wall, I took her face in my hand. “I said you were crazy. I didn’t say you were the bad guy.”

“You haven’t seen me crazy.” An impossible fire flashed through her eyes. “Even today. I wasn’t crazy, Declan. Call me a bitch if you want to, but I’m not crazy. I’m independent, and I’m a cunt, and you love to hate that. You hate that I don’t need you. My life has been more fucked up than yours, and I had to learn shit you never had to. If I didn’t, we wouldn’t have fucking survived. That’s what you hate. You hate that I can do things without you. But I don’t need —”

Grabbing her face, I leaned in and kissed her hard. So hard that I felt the ache of the wall against her back. Lifting her up around my hips, kissing her, grinding my hips against hers, hearing her whimper, I grabbed a fistful of her hair and yanked her head back.

The smell of her arousal drifted into my nostrils, and I ground in closer, relishing in the little whimper she released. “Oh, you don’t need me? Not for anything, huh?”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Brooke

One moment, he was kissing me, pinning me to the wall with his body, and the next, I was shoving him up against the opposite wall in the hallway, tearing off his shirt. Then my panties were on the floor, and his jeans weren’t far behind, and he was lifting me into the air again, only to set me down on the entry table. Everything on its top was clattering to the floor, but all he cared about was unhooking my bra.

With each touch of our lips, I couldn’t tell if we were trying to tongue fuck one another’s mouths, or if we were trying to tear each other faces off. When I pulled away for half a second, and he bit my lip to keep me where he wanted me, I had to assume the latter.

This made no sense. We made no sense.

I knew that. Clearly, so did he. That’s why we were here. That’s why this was happening the way it was, the way it so often did.

I loved him. Whether he knew it or not, whether he believed me or not, I fucking loved him. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have let him manhandle me into his bedroom and toss me onto the bed like some sort of toy.

For him, I would be that. If he asked me to lie there like a fuck doll, I would. If he wanted me to suck his dick while he watched a football game, not paying me an ounce of mind otherwise, I would. Whatever he wanted, sexually or any other context, I would give it to him.

Any time he needed me, anytime he wanted me, I was there. I may have been there with an attitude, but I was there. I was always there to give him what he needed, to be there however he needed me to be, and I didn’t know what more I had to do to prove it to him.

And it infuriated me. It infuriated me that I would do anything for this fucking man, and he still didn’t believe me when I told him how much he mattered. When I showed him every God damned day.

The fact of it was, he loved my attitude. If he didn’t love these fights, he wouldn’t start them.

But he did. He always did.

I knew that I wasn’t perfect. Never once had I tried to hide that fact. But I hated more than anything that throughout this fight, he made it out like I was the only one with the problem. He treated me as though he was oh-so-much softer than I was. Like he was a big, affectionate teddy bear, and I was a lunatic with a pitchfork.

He wanted to act like I was a horrible bitch? I’d show him one.

When he collapsed to the bed on top of me, bringing his lips to mine once more, I caught his bottom lip between my teeth. Not a gentle nibble, but a bite so hard that I tasted iron on my tongue.

Grabbing my wrists, he pinned me to the bed. Only then did I release his lips.

Declan straightened above me, teeth gritted to a hard line. “Really, Brooke?”

I laughed. Maybe not the smartest thing to do with all things considered, but he looked cute with the blood dribbling from his lip. So angry, so furious, and it was nice to see that I wasn’t alone in my misery. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I do need you for one thing.”

“And you think a good way to fucking get it is to bite me?” Glaring down at me, he ground his hips and closer, teasing me with the head of his cock. “You’re on thin ice, sweetheart. You might want to watch the way you fucking behave right now.”

“Why is that?” There was no denying how condescending my voice came off. I didn’t care, either. Maybe it was a part of the game. This twisted, sick game of love and romance that the two of us played like a gambler at a slot machine with a credit card that would never run out. “You gonna spank me? Make me bleed? Not much of a punishment if I like it, is it?”

Teeth still gritted, eyes still narrowed, he squeezed my wrists tighter. He squeezed so tight that it hurt. Not just an ache, but a deep, throbbing hurt. But he must’ve felt it, because as soon as that intense, rumbling pain stretched up my arm, he released. Not entirely, of course. He still had me pinned to the bed, but his grip wasn’t so ferocious.

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