The boy, on a determined walk, didn’t respond to me. He gripped my hand tighter by the second as he led me into the start of the forest. I looked at him more closely. I hadn’t noticed him at the party before. Suddenly this felt all wrong.

He’s just a kid. He’s just a kid.

He stopped abruptly ten feet into the bush and let go of my hand. Then he looked up at me, pressing his lips down hard as if he was trying to keep his mouth shut.

“Who are you–” I was cut off by a hand over my mouth, and then an arm around my waist pulled me back into the chest of someone large and muscled.

The little boy looked above my head and nodded. Then he took off running deeper into the bush in a direction he seemingly knew where to go. My heart pounded speedily against my chest as I tried to get out of the firmness of this man’s grip.

“Stop, stop,” came the voice. I stilled immediately and shut my eyes.

“Good,” Jaxon said, dropping his arms down.

In that nanosecond I’d already made up my mind. Without turning to look at him, I ran a few steps in the direction of the party. Arms grappled around me again.

“REM–” His hand covered my mouth once more, rougher than before, and slammed the back of my head into his chest.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” he growled with his mouth to my ear. “Don’t you fucking dare sell me out again, Sara.”

He dragged me back until we were well concealed and stopped against a tall, thick tree. He turned my body around and pushed my back against the rigid bark. Hand still over my mouth, he lowered his body down until his face was level to my own. I blinked rapidly; despair consumed me at the sight of his blue eyes looking into my own. My body shook in his grip.

Wearing his signature hoodie and jeans, his hair had grown somewhat since the last time I’d seen him. There was a shadow of a beard coming in, as if he hadn’t bothered grooming himself. His lips, kissable and plump, were pressed harshly together, and his arrow straight nose was flaring wickedly at me. This was the look of a fuming man.

“You were going to scream for him?” Disbelief overshadowed his anger.

I made no movement. I just watched the shock in his eyes with a sick feeling in my chest.

“Did you fuck him?” The harsh way in which he asked the question stiffened me.

I didn’t respond. I was too enraged to. If he thought I did… then he might feel a shred of the same pain I felt for weeks. His hand tightened against my mouth, his anger growing by the second. My silence conveyed the lie clear as day. He took a step back from me as if I’d punched him. When his hand dropped, for a split second I considered screaming again. I didn’t, too absorbed in his presence and confused as all hell.

What could he possibly want?
Why ask such a question?
Why even be here?!

“Do you like being with him?” he bitterly asked, voice raw in his anguish.

“Like you should talk,” I retorted. “You told me you were letting me go. We ended it –”

“And you jump straight into someone else’s bed–”

“I didn’t jump straight into his bed!” Well… not in the sexual sense anyway. “You said you were letting me go! Months have passed! Did you want me to keep my legs closed forever while you fuck every girl–”

“I haven’t been with anyone since you!” he furiously gritted out.

While his words sounded genuine, I shook my head in disgust. “I saw you with–”

“You saw me playing the part!”

“She was undressing you!”

“We kissed, yeah, but that was it.”

“Liar!”

He came at me again, a hand on each shoulder and shoved me further back against the tree. “I’m not lying to you. I play the part because of Finley–”

“Liar!” I spat again, scowling at him. I tried to jerk my body away, but he held me perfectly still against him.

“Stop calling me that. Look at me and see I’m telling you the truth.”

I didn’t look at him. I turned my head away from him and at the direction of the party. I could hear the happy chattering and was once again tempted to scream. I didn’t want this. He had no right to show up out of the blue, fuck with my emotions and then lie about who he’d been fucking. I saw him, plain as day, with a woman who was ready to go down on him. Like hell I would believe his bullshit!

Pain erupted at my chin as he gripped it and forced my face in his direction. I struggled against him, stomping at one point on his foot. He didn’t flinch. Fuck him and his steel capped boots!

I couldn’t bear to look him in the eyes. My heart was only so strong. They were windows into his soul, and just one look into them and I would be a goner. I kept them directed at his lips instead.

“Since you came back, it’s just been you,” he whispered. “I play the part, Sara. It’s going to end, though. I promise you, it’ll be over. That phone call… I said shit because I was so fucking hurt by what you did.” He let go of my chin and brought his fingers against my cheek. His sighed longingly as he felt around my face. “I kiss some girls. That’s as far as it’s gotten. I hide away in rooms, pretend I’ve gone all the way to keep Finley off my back. I have to pretend I’m okay so he leaves you alone. So he doesn’t think you’re still affecting me.”

My body deceived me. I looked into his eyes, and there it was: the honesty sincere in all of him, and it was searing me to the bone.

“So he could leave me alone? I don’t understand. Did he… Did he send that man after me?”

“I think he did. I can’t be sure.”

“How did you even know about that? How did you get that paper to me–”

“Why would I tell you that?” He shot me a bitter look, raking his eyes up and down my body accusingly. “You’d sell that person out in a heartbeat the second you got back to your fucked up man.”

“No, I wouldn’t. You’re just saying that because you’re angry. You know you can trust me.”

“No,” he disagreed with a shake of his head. “I don’t know that anymore, Sara. You’ve been at that clubhouse for months on end. For all I know, you’re brainwashed. Tell me, truthfully, why the fuck you gave yourself up to that guy. Tell me it wasn’t because he trapped you in a room for the first four weeks, until you had nobody but him to depend on.”