Page 160 of Broken Breath
“Where’s Luc?”
Otis tips his head toward the exit. “Said he needed some air.”
I hurry outside and barely register the rain until I’m out in it. Fat drops hit my shoulders and soak straight through Finn’s hoodie, but the cold is nothing compared to the ache twisting my chest.
Squinting through the dark and the sheets of rain, I see him, just at the edge of the club’s glow. His forehead is pressed hard against a wall, one arm braced above him, boot slamming into the bricks, kicking out his frustration.
Fuck. I did that, didn’t I?
“Luc,” I call, but the rain swallows my voice. I push forward, my sneakers splashing through puddles, and when I reach him, I catch his arm, tugging. “Stop.Please.”
He turns to look at me, and it guts me, because I can’t tell whether the wetness in his eyes is rain or something worse.
My eyes sting to match.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper, barely holding it together. “Please… stop.”
His blue gaze burns through me, before it flicks down to the hoodie I’m wearing. “You and Greer… are you a thing?”
“No.” I shake my head. “We’re not. It’s not like that.”
I’m just a mistake for him.
Luc’s eyes narrow, the muscle in his jaw ticking. “Did he force himself on you?”
The way he saysforceis like he’s already halfway to throwing fists and burn the world down if I said yes. And that’s what makes it worse.
That hecares.
That I hurt him anyway.
“No.” I shake my head again, flinging the raindrops from my face. “It’s… complicated.”
Complicated in the same way that everything I touch turns to shit. I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore. I’m supposed to be focused, unstoppable, untouchable. Gold or nothing. Not out here getting hurt by one guy only to hurt another.
Luc’s breath shudders out of him as he looks down at his boots with a glare that somehow feels hopeless.
I reach up and cradle his chin, tilting his face back up to mine. “I’m sorry. I never wanted to hurt you.”
He catches my wrist and pulls me to his chest without hesitation. Then he spins us, pressing my back against the cold, wet wall. His body shields me from the worst of the rain, and his heat seeps through the soaked hoodie, while my heart beats out of rhythm as the world narrows to the space between us. He brushes a raindrop from my cheek, knuckles grazing my skin, his gaze locking on mine.
“It would never be complicated with me,” he says gruffly as he traces the curve of my jaw, the line of my throat, the edge of Finn’s hoodie where it gapes loose. “And I would never make you cry.”
He’s so intense, serious, and earnest that each word hammers into my bones.
“I wouldn’t sneak around with you in the shadows,” he continues. “I’d tell thewhole fucking worldyou were mine.”
Mine.
“I’d kiss you in front of everyone because I wouldn’t give a damn who saw.” His hand trails down my side, stopping at my waist, where his fingers splay over my hip, holding me close to him. “I’d hold you in the middle of the pits, just like this, whenever I wanted. Wheneveryouwanted.” He leans in, and I gasp, then shiver when he breathes against my ear. “I’d do anything just to hear you laugh or see you smile. Fuck anything else, anyone who would care. I’d go right now and tell the media people that we belong together, consequences be damned.”
The air between us crackles as he skims his lips across my jaw. Not a kiss, but a promise I can practically taste.
“And when you hurt…” he breathes out, “… I’ll take on the whole damn world to make it better.”
My chest constricts with something like panic becauseGod,I believe him, and that is terrifying.
My soaked hair drips rain onto my face, and I can’t stop my tears from joining them, the warmth of them an intense contrast to the cold droplets.
