The hands were moving. My hips pushed back as fingers splayed over the waist of my jeans. There was a hiss behind me, but it wasn’t angry-sounding. It was hot. I liked that sound. I wanted it to happen again. My eyes were shut, and the basement was gone. There was the hooting of an owl overhead, and when warm lips touched mine, I was suddenly hungry. And eager. And angry. I didn’t know why, but I kissed back. My back arched as another set of lips touched my neck, and the ones on my mouth were suddenly gone and on my belly.
I gasped, my eyes opening as I shot my head down.
Two big brown eyes peered up at me. Cade’s hands were around my hips, wrapping around me like he was steadying me before my knees buckled. I watched as his tongue slipped out from behind his lips and wet the soft skin of my belly, causing things to throb that shouldn’t have been throbbing. My heart thumped viciously as confusion crowded me. Cade waited. He stared up at me, looking as hungry as I felt on the inside but wouldn’t dare recognize on the outside. There was heavy breathing along my neck, and I knew it wasn’t Isaiah. I knew what he smelled like. I knew what his breath felt like on my skin. I slowly moved my head and peeked behind me. Brantley’s eyes were hooded as my back pressed into his firm front, but the second he blinked, I snapped out of it.
“Get your fucking hands off me. Both of you.”
There was the smallest twitch of a smile on his mouth before his grip loosened. The ground crunched as Cade slowly stood up, wiping a hand over his mouth, but he still kept his other hand on my waist. Brantley stayed behind me too, trapping me between them.
I was still shaken from my lapse in reality, but I remembered exactly why I was in the middle of a dark wooded area, sandwiched between two boys who were sent here to find me. My only question was why? Why were they touching me? Were they fulfilling what Isaiah’s father wanted? It didn’t make sense. I wasn’t Bain’s anything. But they made it seem like I was. Was I something more to Bain than he and Isaiah had let on? Regardless of the reasoning, I nearly growled as I locked onto Cade’s face, but before I could say anything, something caught our attention from behind.
Cade peered over his shoulder, and it gave me a direct line to Isaiah. I kept my face steady, but hurt flashed within. His words echoed, and it was the only thing I could hear inside my head. “I’ve already had her.” As if having sex with me was nothing more than a goal to be met. Another game.
“Why the fuck are your hands on her?” he gritted, creeping in closer and looking more lethal than I’d ever seen him. His brows were hooded over his black-rimmed eyes, and his jaw looked as sharp as a butcher’s knife.
It made me irrationally angry to see him, but there was something that sparked to life, too.
My hands pushed at Cade’s chest. He hardly moved but ended up stepping aside to let me through. “Don’t you dare act like you care now!” Isaiah’s resolve fell quickly when he caught my eyes, but I kept going. I kept charging toward him like I was the strong one here. There were too many emotions flinging at me to make me stop, and the only emotion I wanted to grasp onto was anger. I was so angry. The betrayal wiped away any common sense that I had in me to run. “What do you mean why the fuck are his hands on me, Isaiah? You asked Brantley if he wanted a go at me!” His mouth opened, but I kept going. “I’m assuming that invitation extended to Cade as well, right? So don’t stand there all pissed off because your two best friends wanted to touch me like you did!” The fear and pain were beginning to surface, but I locked it down, steadying my feet, and the next thing I knew, my hand was raising, and I was flinging it toward the side of his face.
I waited for the burn against my palm. I knew he’d feel the sting across his cheek that I’d felt so many times before, but just as I went to make contact, his hand shot up quickly, and he grabbed my wrist, right around my ugly little scars. “Gemma,” he snapped. “Stop it.”
“Stop it?” I yelled, trying to whip my wrist back. “You…you…” My eyes bounced back and forth between his, trying to keep up with my courage. “You betrayed me! Have you been using me this whole time? You’ve been warning me that Bain was using me as a toy, but it’s you! You acted like I was nothing more than a simple lay. A conquest. You didn’t tell your father that I wasn’t Bain’s girlfriend. I stood there, with your father’s hands on me, waiting for you to tell him that I was innocent in all of this. That Bain wouldn’t care what happened to me. That I was nothing to him. Yet, you guys stood there and passed me around, threatening to touch me!”
My voice broke, and I felt my wall slowly slipping down. No. I would not stand here and look weak. I glowered up at him as his jaw flexed back and forth. He let go of my wrist, and I snatched it away at the same time, crossing my arms over my chest as my body wracked with a chill.
I was done. I was done playing games. I was done with Bain’s threats and Isaiah’s need to protect me by keeping things from me. Things like this. There were obviously much bigger things going on between the Rebels, Bain, and Isaiah’s father. And I knew Isaiah’s father wasn’t a good person, but what I didn’t expect was for Isaiah to take my trust and stomp on it. I didn’t expect to hear those things come out of his mouth. I didn’t expect to feel the heartbreak just yet and for those reasons. Did he mean what he’d said?
“I hate you,” I whispered, taking a step back. “And I don’t know if you’re using me in this sick game with Bain and your father, but I’m done playing.” It wasn't fair when you didn’t know the rules. Or the objective. I watched as the wall shot up behind Isaiah’s eyes. His nostrils flared. His fists clenched. He crowded my space before I even had a chance to step back, and when he glared down at me, he said, “Good.”