Page 63 of Pretty Broken Wings
“What are we doing?” I ask calmly like we’re friends.
“Chilling.” Axel has his foot propped up on his knee. He clasps his hands behind his head.
Oh my god, the way he’s all comfortable when I feel like jumping out of my skin makes me rage. I want to hurt him. Tie him down and beat him with my bat.
The image of Axel tied down and at my mercy pops into my head without my permission. All those muscles and no way to protect himself. They’d pop out as he’d fight the ties. His veins would too, tracing paths up his muscled forearms.
My skin gets hot.
I shake my head to clear my thoughts, then suck in a calming breath. Then I ask, “What do you want from me, Axel?”
He’s silent for a while. Then he blows out a breath of air. “We’re already doing it.”
A mixture of reactions fills me—impatience, disbelief, and confusion. But I don’t let it show. “We are?”
“Yeah.”
I stare at him in silence. He just wants to hang out with me? Bullshit. What’s behind the lines? Maybe he wants me to stroke his ego or make him feel like he’s a good person. I try to think about why Dad did what he did. Or even Max.
Even thinking about them makes my cheeks hot. They did it because they’re small-dicked men and get off having power over others. It makes them feel powerful.
Does Axel want to feel powerful?
I stare at him. He chews his gum quietly.
If he wants to feel powerful, then he wants me to cower. To cry and fight him. Which is exactly what I did up in the room. But down here, I’m not playing his game anymore.
Axel breaks the silence. “So, your stalker.”
I swallow around a lump in my throat. What is his obsession with Max? Does he feel… threatened?
The thought is so absurd that I almost snort. Almost. Two men fighting over someone who doesn’t want either of them.
“I won’t let you put yourself at risk. You’ll stay with me until I know that’s not an issue.”
His words take a second to register, and I squeeze my hands into fists. He thinks he’s the knight in shining armor, rescuing me from Max?
I press my nails into my palms to feel anything other than the suffocating need to bash Axel’s head in.
“Cool. Now that that’s settled.” Axel gets up, moves to the kitchen, and grabs some things from a bag on the counter. He lays them out on the table, one looking like… a tattoo machine or some sort of tool.
I freeze. He sets out more items. I’m not sure what it is until I see him dump out a bunch of… nail polish?
“Come over,” he says.
I absolutely will not.
Axel takes a deep breath, letting it out. “C’mon. I won’t bite. I’m going to do your nails.”
I blink. The fuck did he just say?
He sets everything up carefully. It looks like he has all the professional equipment a nail salon would. I used to get my nails done a lot. I liked the way they made my hands look, and Max liked them done. Needless to say, I don’t do them anymore.
“Raven,” there’s a note of warning in Axel’s voice.
Power, Raven. He wants to feel like he has power. Controlling the way I look is one way he’ll do that.
Only I don’t want to give him that power. I’d rather rip my nails off than give him that power.
