Addicted to You (Addicted #1)(33)

“You know why,” I breathe. We’re pretending, aren’t we? I’m so confused. What is he to me right now? Friend, boyfriend, something else entirely?

“Once you stepped through that threshold,” Lo says, “you entered my place.” His hot, bourbon-scented breath hits my neck. “Everything in here belongs to me.”

My head lulls dizzily. I hate that I haven’t had sex today. I hate that my body wants Loren Hale. And maybe even my mind too.

I try to concentrate. I have to. “Take it down,” I say again.

“No, I like that photo and it’s staying there.”

Why does he care so much about that stupid picture?!

Before I ask, he spins me around and leans my stomach against his desk but keeps my wrists in his hands, pinning my arms to my back. I try to wiggle out of the hold, but he presses his body to mine, in a position that I’ve fantasized so many times. Just like this (maybe not the submissive part), but with him behind me, his pelvis grinding into my backside. I gape, internally dying. Luckily he can’t see my open-mouthed expression.

I draw in a tight breath. “You’re being mean,” I tell him. He knows I haven’t had sex. When we were eighteen, he asked me what it felt like to go without climaxing for a day, and I told him it feels like someone is burying my head under the sand and pulling my limbs so tight they become taught rubber bands, waiting to be snapped and released. The cravings feel like drowning and being lit on fire at the same time.

He said he could relate to the paradox.

“I know you’re enjoying this.”

Yes, very much so. “Lo,” I breathe. “If you’re not going to have sex with me, you need to back away. Please.” Because I don’t think I can say no. My body wants him so badly that it trembles beneath his weight, but my head has become far more resilient. He’s just teasing me. That’s it. And I don’t want to wake up feeling ashamed about not stopping. He doesn’t like me like that. He couldn’t want someone like me.

He lets go and takes three steps back. I massage my wrists and set them on the desk, not facing him just yet. I collect my bearings—the places inside of me way too tempted right now. When I muster the courage, I spin around, my eyes livid. “What the hell is wrong with you?” He can’t use sex against me, not like that.

His jaw locks, and he spends a great deal of time pouring his next drink. He takes two large swigs and refills it before even beginning to answer me. “Don’t be so serious,” he says lowly. “I was just playing around.”

His words send arrows into my chest. It hurts. I know it shouldn’t. I wanted him to say, it was all real. I meant it. Let’s be together. I know that now, even if being together will bring a whole new set of complications. Instead, he reinforced our fa?ade. It’s all a lie.

“You want to play around?” My body thrums with heat. I storm over to his liquor cabinets, find the magnetic key and open them up quickly.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Lo shouts. I barely pull out two bottles before he has his hand on my wrist, knowing I’m either about to trash them or chuck ‘em out of the window. I haven’t decided which yet.

“Lily,” he growls my name like it’s the most profane word in the dictionary. We’re both furious, and I feel justified in it. I don’t look away. His face sharpens, and I can almost see the gears cranking in his head.

“Let’s talk, Lo,” I say tightly, not moving yet. “How is what I’m doing any different than what you just did to me?”

He inhales a deep breath, eyes narrowing. As always, he calculates each word before speaking. “I’m sorry, okay? Is that what you want to hear? I’m sorry that you can’t handle being touched by me. I’m sorry that the very thought of fucking me disgusts you. I’m sorry that every time you’re horny, I’m here.”

And there goes my breath. I don’t understand what he’s trying to tell me. Does he want me or is he pissed that I’m a sex addict? I carefully set the bottles down on the desk and disentangle from his grasp. I slip into his bathroom and lock the door just as he nears it.

“Lily,” he calls.

I lie on the cold tiles and close my eyes, trying to clear my mind. I’m starting to wonder how much I can take of this—of not knowing the truth of our actions, of our relationship. It’s driving me insane.

My body shudders, a small withdrawal from the lack of stimulation today. I keep my eyes shut and try to sleep it off, but the knob jiggles with the click of the lock. The door opens and Lo pockets a bump key.

I don’t move from my resting place, and I train my gaze on the white ceiling.

Lo sits next to me and leans against the Jacuzzi tub. “You shouldn’t be worried if Daisy heard us. Normal couples fight.”

Right, the charade. Silence thickens, and I’m proud of making him suffer a little.

He shifts on the ground and pulls his knees up, arms loosely wrapping around them. “When I was seven, my father took me into his office and pulled out this small silver handgun,” he says and pauses, rubbing his mouth with a small, dry laugh.

I keep my expression blank, even if the story interests me.

Lo continues, “He put it in my palm, and he asked me how it felt to hold it. You know what I said?” He glances at me. “I told him I was scared. He smacked me on the back of the head and said, ‘You’re holding a fucking gun. The only people who should be scared are the ones on the other end of it.’” He shakes his head. “…I don’t know why I just thought of that, but I keep remembering all of it. The way the gun felt heavy and cold in my hand, how I was so terrified of the trigger or of dropping it. And there he was…disappointed.”