“Mad?” His dark chuckle filled me with embarrassment, but I wouldn’t lower my gaze. “What the fuck would I be mad about?”
“I don’t know.” The quick admission had a way of catching him off guard, and this time, he didn’t recoil when I stepped forward. “You’re the only person I have here, Michael. I just don’t like when you’re upset.”
I wouldn’t waver— not under his eye, not under his touch. Stillness was the only thing he could believe in, and when he was only left with his thoughts, Michael hissed out again. He stepped forward, warm palms finally cupping my hot cheeks, and in the dark, I watched another change come over him. One I was far less familiar with. The confidence that filled him earlier, the one that ridiculed me in the bathroom, changed to something else. His thumbs rubbed a gentle circle against my cheeks, and when he couldn’t quite spit out the snarl he needed the most, I let my hands rest on his wrists.
“If you’re fucking him—”
“No.”
“If you love him,” he corrected. His jaw ground shut before he could spit out another threat, another growl, and our eyes locked again. “I need to know everything, Birdie.”
“I don’t want anything to do with Tristan,” I rushed. “He had no business being in my house. I’d never want someone like him.”
The truth only seemed to push him away; the words he wanted to hear were always the ones that killed him the most. When Michael pulled away from me, I folded my arms over my chest. A painful tear at my side reminded me that I could even protect myself from him anymore.
But then, when had I ever?
“Then you’re an idiot.” His snarl didn’t pause until he felt my eyes from across the room. Michael’s head spun around, and through narrowed eyes, he spit again. “You’re an idiot.”
“I’m not an idiot.”
“Then what the fuck else would you call it, Birdie? This prick is at your house getting pictures for your god damn mom. And all I’ve ever done is—”
A thousand words could have filled the space between us, a reminder of the things that made everything between Michael and I so complicated. Maybe it was stupid for me to want him so recklessly, for me to need him so fiercely. But to think Tristan could ever take his place was just as ridiculous. No one could take Michael’s place. Even he had to know that.
“I don’t—” The words fell short when my chest tightened. Even that wouldn’t be enough anymore. It had never been enough to tell him of the men I didn’t want. “I just want you.”
“Birdie.”
“You’re the only one I like,” I rushed. “I want you.”
“You don’t know what you want.”
“And you do?” The snap forced his eyes into the back of his skull, and my hip jutted to the side. “If you think I could ever be attracted to someone like Tristan, then you don’t know me at all.”
“I don’t know you?” His growl sent a shiver down my spine, and as he closed the space between us, it took everything in me not to cower away. “You’ve spent six years waiting for someone who doesn’t exist, Bridget. You still think fucking me is going to fix something. Like I’m going to admit that I—” Sadness strangled the words in his throat, pulling him away again. “You’re not going to fix me, Birdie. I’m going to destroy you.”
“I want you,” I choked. “I tried to want someone else, but it’s not—”
“You don’t know me, Bridget.” A dark chuckle, a condescending laugh tightened my thighs. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“Yes, I do.”
When the beast landed on me again, it wasn’t Michael’s dark eyes I looked into. It was the beast’s blood-drenched claws that dug into my hip. It was a dark snout that hissed that awful laugh into my ear. It was the caged animal that loved it when I shook for him.
And, god, was I shaking.
“What the fuck do you know about me?” My eyes slammed shut as his lips brushed my ear. “We spent two months together, Bridget.”
“I know you,” I squeaked. When his chuckle tickled my ear again, I forced a new strength to my muscles— one that I hadn’t been able to find six years ago. My palms landed on his hands and my eyes squeezed shut. “I want you.” Despite himself, I felt the admission weaken his grip. “And I think maybe you want me too.”
“What do you—”
“I can handle it, Michael.”
His entire body froze. Whatever warmth I’d been able to bring him, whatever life I brought to hollow bones was gone in a split second. I’d said something wrong again. I’d pushed him away again, and when he straightened up, I sunk my fingers into his shirt. When the beast looked down on me, when his fingers dug so painfully into my scars, I did my best not to shake.
“How do you know what you can handle?” The husky snarl dried my lips. Judging from the shiver that ran through his system, even he noticed that. “How could you haveanyidea what I want to do to you?”