Page 94 of Burn for You

His hurt stabs me right in the chest as much as I wish it wouldn’t. As much as I wish he had no effect on me. In trying to remain unattached, I managed to do the one thing I desperately didn’t want to do—I hurt him. Suddenly the idea that he thinks I was seeing someone else twists the knife, even though that’s exactly what I had planned on doing tonight. I have to mentally pull the blade out before I can follow after him.

I run and catch his arm in my grip. “Raf?—”

“All this time?!”

I shake my head. “No!”

“Someone else then?”

“No!” I yell, feeling defensive. “I?—”

I don’t know what I was even going to say, but I get cut off before I can say anything.

“I can’t believe this. Can’t believeyou.”He shakes his head.

“I’m sorry.” The words feel useless.

“No,I’msorry. I should’ve never let myself get like this with you. This was never going to work, and I don’t know why I ever thought it would. I should’ve believed you when you told me this was nothing more than sex.”

“Rafael, no—” He looks away from me. “I was wrong. I was wrong! It's so much more. Please believe me.” Tears burn in my eyes. “Please.” I reach for his hand, but he pulls it away. “Please, I was scared,” I whisper.

His eyes flicker, but before he can say anything, a voice floats down towards us. “May…is everything okay here?” Dean appears in the street, looking like a weary animal.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Rafael mutters. “This guy.”

“Dean, you should leave.” He doesn’t move. “Seriously, piss off.” I say it with a bit more aggression than he deserved, but I don’t want Rafael to go anywhere. Dean slinks off into the shadows. I’ll have to apologize for that later.

“I hate that guy.”

“He hasn’t done anything to you.” I don’t know why I’m choosing now to defend him. Someone needs to slap me.

“No?” Rafael asks, backing me up against the wall. “Maybe not, but that doesn’t matter. I hate him. I hate him because he can give you everything that I can’t.”

My heart is beating out of my chest.

“Casual. No strings attached, right? Is that what was written in his dumb Tinder profile?”

“I’m the one you should hate,” I whisper, my eyes pricking with tears. We are close enough now that I can feel his warm breath against my cold skin.

He scoffs a laugh. “Oh, I hate you more than you know.”

I flinch at how easily he says it, even though I’ve said it to him so many times myself. I’ve meant it too, but I don’t mean it anymore.

“I hate you because I can’t stop thinking about you. Iburnfor you, May. Every single cell in my body lights on fire when you’re near me.”

He shakes his head. “I can’t give you casual. I can’t give you no strings attached because I’m already attached. Being around you fuels me, whether you hate me or not. And I hate you the most, because you don’t trust that. You don’t trust me enough to stop pretending that you don’t feel that same fire in your belly that I do.” He pokes one of his fingers into my abdomen.

That fire is blazing more than ever at this moment, and I don’t know how to say that out loud. So I just crush his lips to mine.

Rafael doesn’t hesitate. His hands instantly find my body as he kisses me like he did that day at the waterfall, with what I thought was anger and frustration, but what I now recognize as fire.

He groans as I tug his bottom lip between my teeth. “May,” he grits out. I hear the hesitation in his voice. After everything he just said, I don’t blame him. He’s right.

“I’m done with this back and forth. I’m done with all this bullshit.” He gestures in the direction of where Dean was just standing. “I need to know if you're in or out, and if you're out, just tell me. I can’t play this game any longer.”

My eyes sting with unshed tears. In this moment, the thing I feel the most is anger at myself. How could I ever look at this man and think he would hurt me? I’m the one doing the hurting, and I don't want to hurt anymore.

I shake my head. “I’m in.”

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