Page 82 of Break Me
I don’t want to know any of it, and I don’t want to be around them, just like Tess doesn’t want to be around me. We all need space.
I definitely need space from Dumont, but I need to be away from my house, too.
“I was busy,” I manage to say, and Dumont holds me out at arm’s length.
He’s scowling at me. “You were ‘busy’?” he repeats, as if the idea is hilarious. Maybe it is. What do I actually do with my fucking life besides hide?
“Yes,” I say, and I duck under his arms and step away from him. His hands drop like lead weights to his side and he keeps scowling at me from behind his glasses. “My mom is sick, in case you forgot, and—”
“And she doesn’t owe you an explanation for anything.”
My thighs clench at that voice from behind me. Dark and low. Sensual. I can feel Benji’s body heat as he steps up beside me, but I don’t dare look at him.
Dumont frowns. “Who are you?” he asks, taking on his professor air. As if he can ask Benji questions like that and expect an answer. Benji might know him. He might know about us. But it’s very clear from the way Dumont folds his arms over his chest that he doesn’t know shit about Benji Silva.
“Fuck off,” Benji growls at him, not acknowledging his question. “She said she wanted you to let her go.” Benji steps closer to Dumont and I take in his broad back, the dark blue coat he’s wearing hugging his muscles. “And besides that,” Benji says quietly to Dumont, who takes a step back, “professors really should keep their goddamn hands off of their students, don’t you think?”
Dumont peers around Benji to meet my gaze but I just shrug. I could interrupt this, but I don’t have the energy. Nor the inclination.
Dumont faces Benji again and coughs in his fist. “You…” He swallows, trailing off, then sighs. “Okay,” he says, faltering, hanging his head. What a fucking pussy. He steps around Benji and glances at me, and I see his face is pale. I wonder if he’s regretting divorcing his wife. I’m sure his wife isn’t regretting it, wherever she is. “I’ll see you in class, Ava.” Thankfully, he doesn’t phrase it as a question, because I’m not so sure he will see me in class.
Not with the way Benji is looking at me right now as he turns to face me. He has his hands in his jacket pockets and he arches a dark brow.
“Wanna follow him?” he asks, nodding toward Dumont’s back as he walks away quickly, glancing over his shoulder once.
I almost laugh at how scared he looks as he disappears from view, but I bite it back. I don’t want to give Benji that satisfaction.
“Not really,” I answer.
Benji hasn’t contacted me since he dropped me off at home on Friday night, or early Saturday morning, as it was.
I had wanted him to, even though I hated that I had.
But turns out, he hadn’t left after all.
“You still walking Riley to all her classes?” I taunt him, annoyed my words come out with a hard edge. Like I care what he does with Riley.
The corner of his mouth turns up in a small smile. “Jealous?” he asks, closing the space between us, until he’s right in front of me and I have to crane my neck back to look up at him.
I shake my head. “Curious.”
He shrugs. “No,” he admits. “I didn’t walk her to class. Caden took care of that for me. I doubt he’s going to leave her side until she graduates, after his dad got to her again.”
My throat feels dry. “Again?”
He smiles. “You don’t wanna know.”
What he really means is he thinks I can’t handle it. He’s probably right. I already told him I couldn’t handle him, and what he does. Whatever that is. Not to mention he’s taking downers, which means he can’t really handle it either, no matter what he thinks. I think Riley thought I could help him with that problem or something.
But who the fuck am I to help?
And who the fuck am I to judge? I failed an entire semester because I couldn’t stop drinking, running away from my problems. We’re not so different in that regard.
“I do,” I protest softly. “I do want to know.”
Something in his gaze changes. Falters. A softness I’ve never really seen before. But it’s gone in a blink and I’m not so sure I didn’t imagine it. Didn’t just want it to be there.
“Why.” He bites out the word like a command. “You already admitted you can’t handle this.” He gestures to himself, hands still in his jacket. “We live in different countries. Different fucking worlds, Ava.” The last words come out hoarse and I watch his throat bob as he swallows and looks down at the grass between us. “You don’t want to deal with someone like me. And I don’t want to hide who I am.”
