Page 47 of Bound By Temptation

Shit. I wasn’t breathing?Only then did I take in a breath, and it felt like my head started to think a bit.

“Do you want to help me clean up?” I asked, avoiding this entire situation. I didn’t want to talk about it. Think about it. Deal with it. And here it was, right in front of my face. I also didn’t want his help cleaning, but at least if we stayed busy my mind wouldn’t wander.

Ax shook his head, his locks following his movements. While I loved when he had his hat on backward, I also loved his hair just like this; wild and free, nothing holding it back.

My fingers itched to touch it, so I clenched them into fists to keep them still. No way was I touching him.

He leaned over and pulled me closer to him. Even with me standing and him in his seat, he was still taller than me. We were perfect height like this, and his damn lips were so close.

My pulse picked up as he ran his nose along my cheek. Why did this man have to do this? Why. It was my damn trigger with him, and he knew it. The brush of the nose did it every damn time.

Heat flooded me, and I clenched my hands tighter, feeling my nails biting into the skin.

“There’s a lot we need to catch up on.” He started, but it was hard for me to concentrate with him running his hands up and down my arms and his face so close to mine. Distracting. That was what this man was doing. “Know we went our own directions, but it’s time we found our way back.”

Something about what he said snapped me to the present, and I pulled back, breaking free, even taking a step so he had to reach out his arms to touch me.Our way back?Was he out of his ever-loving mind?

He had to be. There was no back. There was no fixing what he broke. There was none of this shit whatsoever.

“There is no going back, Ax. Too little too late. It’s over. We both have moved on with our lives. That was our story, but the book has been finished; the cover slammed shut. You made choices that deeply hurt me, and nothing you say is going to fix it. It’s like a piece of glass once it shatters; the pieces can’t be put back together again because there will always be shards that never fit back in place.”

He shook his head and pulled me into him again. “Would you stop doing that?” I growled low, trying to pull back to which he just stared at me. “Anything is fixable. Glass can shatter and it may take a fuck of a lot of glue, but I’ve got a ton of it and will fix this.”

Ax stared at me in a way that no man had ever done. As if I were the most precious thing on earth and he’d do anything to protect me. I closed my eyes to cut off the sight. I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t take him. I knew he wouldn’t protect me. He didn’t before.

He released my arm and cupped my face, and his thumb traced my bottom lip.

God, why did this man have to be this man? He could be anyone else except Ax, and I’d fall hook, line, and sinker. First the nose brush, then the thumb.

Now I was holding on by the tips of my fingernails, and I refused to let go and give in. I couldn’t.

“Open your eyes, Indie.”

I didn’t want to. Didn’t want to see what was reflected in them, but I did anyway and met his eyes, sucking in that anger.

“Know I fucked us up. Young, dumb, but I don’t live my life with regrets except the pain I caused you.”

My mind drifted, and I was unable to stop the past coming forth.

“Whore!” Was called out as I moved through the hallway, each step coming like lead weights. The name calling doesn’t shake me; I couldn’t give two fucks what anyone thought of me, but the cat-calling, the whistling. All of the unwanted attention was too much. What happened to live and let live and all that shit? It was relentless.

“Is there a sign-up sheet for you? I want in!” another boy yelled out. I kept my head down and moved quickly, wanting desperately to get away.

Away from here.

Only no place felt far enough in this very moment.

“Yeah. From what I saw you’re loose enough to take three or four of us at once.” This came from a different voice, but I didn’t stop to look.

“We can all take turns.” Laughter burst out as I ran out the doors of the school and to my car.

Tears flowed down my face.

The damage was too much. I’d never come back from this.

Ax. He did this. He couldn’t fix this. Heartbreak and hatred had become one in the same. I had more questions than answers but no desire to even see the man to ask a single one.

I was a ghost. Non-existent. I went from having friends, to not in the blink of an eye. I went from being with the most popular boys in the school, to being a whore who fucked anything and everything.

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