Out of Bounds (The Summer Games #2)(94)

She swallowed.

“I want that too.”

Her eyes narrowed, assessing whether or not she could believe me.

“Oh, but you wanted it after your night with Valerie? How was your dinner last night, by the way? Did you both have a good time?”

I shook my head and stepped closer, invading her space. “Don’t do that.”

“I’m not doing anything. Last night was a mistake. Let’s chalk it up to temporary insanity, all right?”

She spun around to leave, but I reached out for her arm and yanked her back to me.

“At the end of this, you’re mine.”

She laughed. “Funny that you think I’ll wait for you.”

“It’s five days, Brie.”

“Five days too late.”

I bent low and whispered against the nape of her neck. “Why are you fighting me?”

She scoffed and yanked her arm out of my hold. “Because that’s what we do, we fight. The fact that I thought we would ever work out as anything more than a quick f*ck was ludicrous.”

I let her go and she spun around to face me, following her last insult with another.

“I didn’t ever want you.”

“You’re lying. You meant what you said last night.”

“No,” she insisted through clenched teeth. “I hate you.”

I wrapped my hand around her slender neck, pulling her toward me. “You love me.”

Her mouth dropped open in shock. For two seconds, I saw the reality there, the truth in her eyes, but as quickly as she dropped her mask, she recovered. “What is there to love, Erik? The bickering? The insults? A therapist would tell us to get the hell away from each other. This isn’t healthy. You…y-you are toxic.”

I wrapped my hand around her waist and tugged her body flush with mine. “I don’t give a shit about that—the fighting, the bickering. What do you want? A date? You want me to take you out to dinner and hold your hand? You want me to take you back to my place and strip you down, show you how much you mean to me? I’ll f*cking do it.”

“Stop,” she said, shaking her head and trying to put distance between us. “Just stop. This is over.” She pushed against my chest, trying to shove me away. “For the next five days, do me a favor and pretend I don’t exist.”

“Impossible,” I said.

She kept pushing against me until I finally released her. She put a foot between us and kept building on it until I couldn’t reach out and grab her. She wasn’t mine anymore.

“Stay away from me, Erik.” Her eyes blazed with fury. “I mean it.”





Chapter Thirty-Five


Brie





Why didn’t Olympic condos come with ovens? Jesus Christ, I’d never needed to bake so badly in my entire life. Why couldn’t I have adopted a more practical and portable coping mechanism, like knitting? Anything to take my mind off Erik. He couldn’t do that to me. He couldn’t leave me hanging on the sidewalk, walk away with another woman, and then in the morning decide he wanted me again—as if he could whistle or snap his fingers and I’d be there, waiting at his feet like a little pet.

No.

I’d stayed up until 2:30 AM the night before, rolling side to side and squeezing my eyes closed, but in the end, I always caved. I’d reached to my bedside table and checked my phone, praying I’d find a missed call or a text message waiting to resolve everything for me, but every time I checked and my phone was blank, my heart split a little more.

If he felt something for me, he shouldn’t have walked away. He should have called or texted me. Something.

The longer I’d stayed up, the angrier I became, and by the time he walked into the gym the following morning, I was ready to tear his head off. I meant every word I said to him, even if he thought I was bluffing. I couldn’t keep up with him. He wanted me, he didn’t want me. He used me, he tossed me aside. I couldn’t keep dedicating hours of my life to dissecting his every move. It was exhausting, toxic. I had five more days left in Rio and I wanted to pour every ounce of my concentration into gymnastics.

I worked out hard, tore through my morning routines, and headed back to the village with the rest of my team for lunch. Lexi, Rosie, Molly, and I hightailed it to the food court. The lines were long, but we didn’t let it deter us. We were all starving and by the time we found a spot near the center of the room, my tray was topped with a protein smoothie, grilled chicken, and enough vegetables to feed a family of five.

We filled the small table and I pushed my tray to the spare seat beside mine, spreading my food out in front of me and realizing I might have gone a little overboard.

“Does anyone want some steamed broccoli?”

I angled my bowl toward the group and Lexi laughed. “Ew. No. Don’t try to pass your poor food choices onto us.”

The bowl rattled against the table as I dropped it and reached for my smoothie.

“As soon as I finish competing, I’m going to devour an entire chocolate cake,” I said, envisioning it in my head. “Like that chubby kid in Matilda, except I’m going to enjoy every bite.”

Molly glanced up and laughed, her mouth full of whatever healthy crap she’d shoved onto her own plate. I was about to ask her what the green mush on her fork was, but her gaze went over my head and her eyes went wide as saucers. A shadow loomed behind me and I glanced up in time to see Erik standing beside our table with a tray of his own. Without asking permission, he stacked his tray on top of the empty one beside me and stole the last empty seat at our table.