Page 97 of Once Upon A Small Town Secret
“Paige,” he murmurs against my cheek.
“What the fuck?”
The words hit me like a freight train. I freeze, fingers still tangled in Ben’s hair, and then everything happens at once—my heartbeat in my throat, Ben’s breath stuttering against my cheek, the squeal of the hinges as the office door finishes swinging open.
Jason stands in the doorway, one hand fisted white around the knob, the other hanging uselessly at his side. He takes us in—me on the desk, Ben braced between my knees, papers creased and crooked under my thighs, my mouth kiss-reddened, his shirt rumpled—and something shuts down behind his eyes.
Chapter Thirty Two
Ben
Jason’s voice stops us dead in our tracks, and for half a second, everything in me shuts off—breath, brain, whatever instinct I’ve got left.
Paige goes still under my hands. My mouth is still on her cheek when the rest of the scene catches up: her legs bracketing my hips, invoices wrinkled under her, the door yawning open with us in full view of it.
“Jason,” I start, lifting my head.
He steps fully into the room, and the expression on his face slams anything else back down my throat. I’ve seen him angry—at refs, at broken equipment, at some drunk that wouldn’t quit—but I’ve never seen his eyes look like this. Not hot. Cold. Flat. Like the lights in him just flicked off.
“What the fuck is going on?” he says, not really asking.
I put my palms up without thinking, palms to a fire. “Listen—”
“Don’t.” He cuts his gaze at my hands. “Don’t you even start.”
Paige slides off the desk fast, smoothing her clothes down as she does. She goes to stand beside me, and I can feel her shaking. I move an inch in front of her on reflex. Not to hide her. To catch whatever is about to fall.
“Jason,” she says, small and steady all at once. “Please—”
He doesn’t even look at her. “You,” he says, eyes on me like he can pin me to the wall with them. “My best friend. My sister.” Every word is an indictment. “In your office?”
“It’s not—” I try again; he talks right over me.
“How long?” His mouth twists. “You know what? Doesn’t matter.”
“Jase,” I say, lower now, as if my voice alone might lower the tension in the room. “I’m sorry. I should have told you—”
He laughs, one hard exhale that sounds like something breaking. “Told me? Told me?” He takes one step in, then another, and I don’t back up. “What were you going to tell me, Ben? That you’re fucking my sister?”
“Jason.” Paige’s hand finds my wrist. He still doesn’t look at her. No, his look of betrayal is reserved for me.
“It’s not what you think,” I say, even as my brain screams at me that it is exactly what he thinks.
“Yeah?” He tips his head. “Then what is it?”
There are a hundred right ways to handle this. None of them arrives in my mouth.
“We should talk,” I say. Lame. Useless. True.
The vein in his temple jumps. “No. You should shut the hell up.”
The hit comes faster than I expect. He’s in my space, and then his fist is making contact with me. The office tips as it sends me stumbling. Bright light explodes behind my eye, and paperwork skids under my boot. I catch the desk with my hip, and the corner bites through denim.
“Jason!” Paige’s voice rips, sharp, scared.
I blink until the stars start fading and taste copper. My hands are up again by instinct, not to fight. To keep him off me if he cocksback for another. I don’t lift them higher than my shoulders. I am not hitting him. I am not hitting him.
“Okay,” I say through my teeth, jaw already throbbing. “I deserve that.”
