Page 181 of Vile Boys

Suddenly, he grips my wrists and shoves me up against the door, his half-mast hazel eyes so striking it’s hard to look away. “Make me believe it.”

With a taunting gaze, he hovers close again, and I slam my lips right back on his.

He kisses me back with just as much fervor, claiming my mouth like it’s the only thing keeping him from jumping off a goddamn cliff, and it feels powerful. Daunting. Wrecking.

To the point where I claw my way out of his grip and wrap my arms around his neck, pulling him closer into me so our two broken souls meld into one.

Caleb

I could no longer stopmyself. I had to kiss those beautiful perky lips even though I know I’m sucking the life out of her like a goddamn soul-stealing demon from hell.

But I don’t care anymore.

I need that spark, that little ounce of happiness I siphon out of her every time our lips collide.

It’s the only thing that’s keeping me breathing.

Keeping me sane.

The thought of her ruins me.

Destroys every inch of my sanity until I can no longer think straight, and I hate her for it.

I hate how much she’s weaved her way into my life without a thought as to how easily she makes everyone around her fall for her. How easily she makes us all crave to poison her innocence.

But I hate most of all that it’s driven a wedge between Ares and me. The only man who’s ever understood me. The only man who’s ever cared enough to be there for me.

I wanted him, and then he wanted her, so I had to make her pay.

But along the way, I fell.

I fell so hard my lungs began to crack, and the only way I could suck in the oxygen was when I was with her.

God …

God can’t help me now.

I kiss her so hard it makes the tears in my soul dry up as I pour every ounce of my sadness into her. She can take it. She knows what it feels like to need something so desperately you feel like you can’t live without it. What it is to grieve without grieving, to live like a shadow of oneself, to haunt the world, searching for your own goddamn soul.

She’s seen death with her own damn eyes.

She knows. I can feel it in the way she kisses me back with equal desperation.

And the second she told me the truth about her father, the last ounce of hostility I was holding on to vanished.

“We have to stop,” she murmurs, but I can’t take my lips off hers.

I refuse. If I do, the dream will shatter, and so will I.

“No.”

“Caleb.”

I groan into her mouth, kissing her one last time with everything I have to give before I have to return to reality.

“Your phone.”

My eyes burst open, and I tear my lips away from hers, still heady from the way she kissed me back.

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