Page 116 of Spearcrest Knight

“You want everybody to like you,” I point out, voice low.

It’s half a joke, half the truth—mostly designed to break some of the unbearable tension. Tension that’s built between us while I bandaged his hand, tension that’s been building since we had sex by the assembly hall, and when we kissed in his house and in the peace garden.

Tension that’s been building for years, and started that day he turned his back on me, on our friendship.

Evan lifts his bandaged hand to my cheek. I turn my head to look at him so he doesn’t hurt himself, but his fingers trail to my jaw and stay there. His hair, wet with sweat, curls on his forehead, falling over one eye. His gaze is direct and piercing.

“I wantyouto like me,” he says, low but firm. “I wantyou.”

He pauses. I don’t know what to say. I close the space between us, pressing my mouth to his. His lips fall open like flowers unfurling for the sun. A low sound, hunger and want, rumbles in his throat. I brush my tongue against his, letting the heat from his mouth trickle into mine.

This kiss is long and slow and deep, the warmth of our breaths mingling. His fingers are still on my jaw.

I pull away to catch a breath. “Evan.”

My voice is so rough it almost breaks. Evan’s eyes widen as I speak, a mixture of fear and desire flashing across his face. He stops my mouth with another kiss and I sigh against his lips and kiss him back, incapable of denying him.

My fingers curl into the folds of his shirt while he holds my head gently in his hands, his fingertips tickling the hair at the back of my head. His mouth tastes of alcohol and blood.

I pull away to catch my breath but Evan can’t seem to stop. He kisses the corner of my mouth, my burning cheeks, my jaw. I tilt my head back, and shudder as his lips trail burning kisses along the column of my neck, the stretched tendons, the fluttering pulse.

Nestled into the crook of my neck, he speaks quietly. “I like you, Sophie. I like you so fucking much.”

I lick my lips nervously and try to push him away. “Evan…”

“No.” He shakes his head and touches a finger to my lips. “Don’t, Sophie. There’s nothing to misunderstand or misinterpret. I like you, I’ve always liked you, no matter how unforgivably I’ve acted. I like everything about you. Your frown, your hair, your gorgeous fucking eyes and your voice and your mind. I like your sharp tongue and your mean streak. I fucking like you so much my chest feels like it’s going to explode. I even like it when you hurt me, because I’d rather be hurt by you than adored by anybody else.”

I stare at him, eyes wide, mouth wordlessly open.

“And I know that I fucked up, Sophie, and you get to hate me if you want to—I understand why you would. I’ve been a shitty person, I’ve done shitty things because I was desperate and stupid and didn’t grow a backbone when I should have. And you can hate me for all that—I hate me for it too. But you don’t get to ignore how I feel or pretend you don’t know. You know, now. You don’t get to explain away my feelings or analyse me like your Hamlet or Captain Wentworth. I’m a real human being—sometimes not a great one—with real feelings. And I like you, really a fucking lot. I want to take you on dates, I want to go to parties with you and be the one who gets your drinks. I want to kiss you and I want to fuck you face to face, and I want you to say my name when you come. I don’t want to be your practice run at having a stupid American boyfriend. I want tobeyour actual stupid American boyfriend.”

My cheeks grow hot at his words. Not just my cheeks, my body, too. He leans over and kisses my mouth, a slow, soft kiss, lips closed. Then he lies back on the bed with a sigh of exhaustion. I stretch out next to him and he turns towards me.

We face each other in silence for a moment.

“This evening isn’t going at all the way I expected,” I say.

He laughs softly. “No, me neither. I had very different plans for tonight.”

“Like what? Getting shit-faced and taking bets on who would win in a fight between Theodora and Zachary?”

“Hah! I mean yes. But also plans to do with your tights.”

He points at my legs. I frown, glancing down at them. “My tights?”

“Yeah. I’m a little obsessed with them.”

“You are?” I roll onto my back and stick up a leg. “So you like my tights, huh?”

“Mm, yeah…” His voice becomes low and rough. “I really fucking like them. I wanna touch your legs through them.”

“Yeah?” I turn my head. “What else?”

He moves closer, and leans over me to answer against my ear. “I wanna lick your pretty pussy through them. I wanna rip a hole in them and fuck you nice and slow.”

I squeeze my thighs over the trickle of hot wetness pulsing there. I bite my lip and laugh. “Who knew you were so hard for fishnets?”

Evan’s mouth moves slowly against my jaw. “It’s not the fishnets I’m hard for, Sophie.”

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