Page 77 of Intense
They track every inch of my face, dissecting me.
Assessing me. Breaking me open.
And I can’t hide. Not from him. Not now.
The tears have already betrayed me.
“Your tears won’t have the desired effect on me, love.”
He leans in so close I can feel him in my bones.
“They have quite the opposite, actually.” His fingers slide from my cheek to my throat, coiling tight.
“But this isn’t the real you. Is it?” His voice dips into something darker. Hungrier. “You’re like me. We don’t break. We don’t show our weakness in front of people.”
My bottom lip trembles.
Wrong move.
His grip tightens, jaw twitching with disdain.
He tuts like I’ve failed some unspoken test. “I thought my wife could take a joke,” he says coldly. Like he doesn’t care. Like this game means nothing to him.
But it means everything to me.
“That wasn’t a joke. That was humiliation in front of all of my colleagues in a career that means everything to me. You have no fucking idea what I’ve had to do to get here.” I spit the words with fire, but they burn me on the way out.
His eyes go narrow. A storm brews in the space between us.
“You really think you know me, huh? Rich boy this, rich boy that. You think you’re the only one here who has felt real pain?”
Then he drops me.
Like I’m disposable. Like I don’t matter.
And that hurts more than anything.
He steps away, shoving his palm against his chest.
“You think my life was a walk in the park? Do you believe I was always this fucking ice cold?”
He looks like he wants to tear his own skin off.
“You don’t get this fucked up for nothing, temptress.”
Suddenly, he’s in my face again. So close I can taste the fury on his breath.
But instead of striking, he drags the back of his hand across my cheek. It’s so soft compared to the fury radiating from him.
“I don’t hide my crazy. I am who I am. But you? You’re trying to conceal it, like I can’t see straight through you. Like I haven’t spent the past six years analyzing your every move. I know you, Stephanie. Now how about you fucking show me?”
My head shakes before I can stop it. He doesn’t know me. Not really.
Not the parts that still wake up screaming. Not the girl who crawled out of hell just to prove she was worthy of the title doctor.
“No, Finn. Just fuck off.”
He cackles.
