Page 53 of Revolve
My chest heaves, and my rain-soaked lashes send droplets of water cascading down my cheeks, like tears. My words are tangled inmy throat. Dylan closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and then meets my gaze directly. The intensity of his stare is unsettling.
“You won’t tell me how to fix this,” he says sharply. “You’re struggling, and I can feel it, yet you’re so fucking stubborn that you won’t let me help. If you’d just tell me what’s stopping you from trusting me completely, we wouldn’t be in this mess.”
My lips stay pressed together as the rain drums on them. His words are sharp jabs at my chest. There’s a pinch in my throat that tries to force the words out, but they don’t come. They stay tied up in an old knot that was created so long ago, I no longer know how to unravel it. I want to tell him I’m trying, that this isn’t easy for me anymore, but I’m stuck.
I clench my fists, cursing myself for my silence and for making him believe I don’t care. Just as I gather the strength to speak, Dylan shakes his head and looks away. My eyes track his movements as he yanks his hoodie over his head. Underneath, he wears a snug, dark green long-sleeve shirt, those tight ones he often practices in.
“Take it,” he orders.
If I was speechless before, I’m pretty sure my throat has closed up entirely now. The navy DU hockey hoodie, marked with his last name on the sleeve and his number on the back, hangs from his hand like a sacred artifact. I stare at it. He extends it toward me again, and I feel the weight of his silent plea.
“Your teeth are chattering. Wear it, Sierra.”
“What about you?” I say, barely above a whisper.
He doesn’t answer, so when a shiver racks through me, I take the hoodie from him and pull it over my head. The warmth of his body heat still lingers on the cotton, and I let it soak into my cold, wet skin, mingling with the fresh scent of his body wash. The hoodie wraps around me like a hug, and an ache settles in my chest, deepening when I catch him glancing back to check if I’ve put it on.
With my ice-cold hands buried in his hoodie, we walk toward along strip of lights ahead of us. The quiet feels louder than the whistling wind.
“I’m trying,” I finally say. A part of me hopes the background noise of the occasional passing cars and rustling trees will drown out my words, but when he tenses, I know he heard me.
Just as I brace myself for him to say something liketry harderorthat’s not good enough, he turns so I can see the side of his face illuminated by the flickering streetlights we pass. In a soft voice he says, “That’s all I need.”
My mind tries to convince me that I heard him wrong. After everything I said, how could he be so understanding?
Those thoughts vanish when the blaring honk of a car and its glaring headlights make me jump, and I stumble right into Dylan. He grabs my shoulder and pulls me close until I’m practically tucked under his arm.
“Get off the damn road! This is West Hartford, not the boonies,” the driver shouts from his cracked window.
West Hartford? We found the main road! I can’t contain my smile of pure joy when I twist to look at Dylan, who shares an exhausted, lopsided smile with me.
“I know where we are. Come on,” Dylan says. This time when we start walking again, my chest practically caves into itself when warm fingers, wet from the rain, intertwine with mine, pulling me along.
The pink sign with flashy yellow bulbs on the perimeter lights up the entrance to Lola’s Diner.
“I don’t have money,” I tell him.
“I’ll take care of it,” Dylan says before the server arrives to seat us. She seems to know him, and he enjoys the attention, because he whispers something to her that makes her laugh and squeeze his arm. A little too long if you ask me. Especially since she’s seen his hand in mine. We could be together for all she knows.
You’re not.
I slide into the booth, and when I’m about to pull away my hand,partly in annoyance, and partly because I expect him to sit across from me, he holds on tighter and squeezes his big frame right beside me in the booth. We’re close, too close.
That’s when I notice the ring of black around his iris. Where he’s all brown eyes, brown hair, and golden skin, I’m dark hair, a red lip, green eyes. Everything about me is icy and edged, like my skates. It feels obvious when we’re this close.
I try to pull back. “I don’t think bonding means you can’t leave my side.”
“What if I don’t want to?”
I shoot him a bored look. “So we’re back to this? Flirting with me?”
“That wasn’t flirting,” he says, leaning in close. “If I were flirting, your ass would be in my lap instead of on this cheap leather.”
I bristle. “Good thing you’re not flirting, then.”
“Do you want me to?” he whispers, our noses inches apart. “We can order drinks. I know you like sharing those.”
My pulse spikes. This is the first time he’s mentioned that night at the party when I drunkenly let him taste the alcohol from my lips. Now he’s so close, and his lips look so warm. Unconsciously, I feel myself leaning in because I’m sure if he pressed his wet body against mine, it’d light me up. His tongue would be hot and skilled and—
