Page 20 of Honey Pot

“Maybe I came back to ruin your life,” she whispered, and a sick smile spread across my lips, curling at the corners. The shock in her eyes was delicious.

“Too late.” I dared to brush my nose against hers and watched as her jaw tensed in response. “I managed to do that just fine on my own. Why are you really here?” I asked her again.

A tiny huff left Clementine as she lowered back down away from me. Her head tilted to the side as her brows pinched together, watching me, always watching.

“You don’t get to call me Clem anymore,” she warned. “You don’t even get to call me Clementine. It’s Mary now.”

“I’m not calling you Mary,” I said, without hesitation.

“You’ll call me what I tell you to call me. You don’t run my life anymore, Cael Cody.” The hostility that blanketed us was thick and weighed down on my shoulders like an anvil and I couldn’t understand why. “I can ruin your entire career if I want.” She was bluffing, but it made my heart race. She was so confident, unafraid, and loud.

“Threaten me, Clem,” I said tightly in an attempt to ignore the arousal. “It doesn’t matter.” I stepped closer and our chests brushed together. I looked down between us and ran my fingers across her chest, stopping to feel her heart beating beneath so rapidly.

It was clawing its way back to me.

“You’re mine, and I’m yours.”

For a moment, I saw her, that girl I loved. She was there with a Texas spirit, a big heart, and even bigger dreams, hiding beneath whatever hardened version she portrayed. She was fooling herself if she thought calling herself Mary would protect her from us. Hurt and heartbreak flickered across her face for a split second before the fire returned.

“I haven’t been yours for seven years, Cael.”

“Oh see—” I pulled away finally, gasping for air as I teetered on the edge of a breakdown. “That I don’t believe, not even for a second. How many have there been, Clem?”

She bristled at my question. “That’s none of your business.”

“The number doesn’t matter.” I tilted my head to the side and smiled at her, wide and bright—enough to make her shift on her feet, and I knew that I was under her skin. “It doesn’t bother me either. How many have made you forget?”

There it was, her defense crumbling when she realized what I was getting at.

“And I’m talking really forget, Clem,” I searched her eyes for the answer, counting the freckles of gold that danced in her irises. “When they were buried inside of you, making you feel good, how many of them made you forget how I made you feel? The touch of my skin on yours?” My reach was long enough to brush a finger against her jaw, even at the distance.

I was playing a dangerous game with our emotions, when all I really wanted to do was lift her around me, carry her to my room, and never see the light of dayagain. But she didn’t feel that way, it was loud and clear. Something had cracked in her in my absence and I couldn’t help but feel the guilt that seeped in.

I swallowed tightly, waiting for her response, and tried to ignore the anxiety that feasted on my insecurities. I expected her to lash out, maybe cry. I was cruel and rude, but I needed to know how deep her resentment for me ran. Evidently, her anger was still loud, but had the memories of us slipped too far from our reach?

“You are so different.” She stared at me, her fingers twitching at her side like she wanted to touch. “What happened to you?”

The response drove the knife in my chest home. The blade burned and twisted at my sensitive skin like it was truly buried there. I bit down hard on my tongue to keep my eyes from watering. The way she stared at me broke down too much, too fast.

I could feel the angry, bitter monster climbing out from where I had shoved it the day I got clean, and before I could stop the vile shit it threatened to spill, I choked out, “You.”

She flinched at the response.

“Ms. Matthews?” Silas turned the corner, and I took another full step back.

He looked between the two of us.

His gray eyes landed on me. “Everything alright?” He asked. I couldn’t be sure if accusation or concern settled behind his gaze.

“I’m just getting to know Mary,” I said with a clenched jaw. I saw the praise flicker in her eyes. “I’m going to get dressed; I have a meeting with Ella.”

A stupid lie. Silas narrowed his eyes at me. I didn’t have a meeting, but it was better than being in this suffocating situation.

“Alright, we’re having dinner here, tonight, to welcome her into the Nest.”

The muscles in my neck and back tightened as I turned to him. “She’s staying here?”

“It’s easier for her to conduct the interviews if she’s not driving to and from the city,” he explained, but the reason alone wasn’t enough to justify letting her stay here. There were hotels in town. “Your Dad insisted.” Silas tapped his fingers to his chest, searching for an answer to the tension that suffocated us, but I didn’t respond. I wasn’t okay.

---