Crushed (Torn #7)(46)

This entire situation was as maddening as it was sad. I was sad for him, for me, for the both of us wanting the same thing at different times. Regardless, my love for him had brought me here, and there was no going back.

Although I couldn’t deny seeing him torn because of me made me feel all sorts of emotions, one emotion stood out—the weird thing they called attachment. Yes, whatever emotions he had, I was attached to them. Whatever he was going through, as much as it pained me to admit it, I was feeling it, as well. It was a dreadful position to be in, but that was how it was with him, and it seemed like it would remain that way.

Taking a few steps towards him, I made a quivering smile, quite unsure about everything. “Please don’t be mad. I said I was sorry—”

“I’m not mad.” He barely glanced in my direction. Instead, he perused the floor with rapt attention.

A great liar, he definitely wasn’t.

“You are. You know you are,” I insisted, standing my ground as I slowly approached his side before finally having the will to sit next to him on the bed. “You look at me differently when you are,” I finished saying, my heart thudding madly against my chest.

“I said I’m not, so can you please drop the subject now?” His eyes remained glued to the floor, uncaring about my efforts in trying to reach out to him.

Well, I would on one condition. “Am I forgiven?”

“If you move your things from Carter’s room to mine, I just might.”

Did he just say that without even looking at me? Was he totally serious? Because if he was … well, what the f*uk? He was playing a whole different game here. If he wasn’t rattling my cage before, he was after this new development. This was a game changer.

I wasn’t sure how to respond to him as my hand rubbed my chest to try to calm myself down. This was a new Brody, and he was freaking me the f*uk out.

“I want you here until Trista gets back.” His eyes finally found mine, searing me whole. “You’ve been very vocal about not wanting to be with me … Maybe we can use this time to come to terms with our past and move on from each other once time’s up.”

Well, f*uk. Was that an invitation to have one last fling before we sorted ourselves out and parted ways as amicably as possible? A side of me thought it logical, but another deemed it tragic. However, the hopelessly in love part of me considered it to be one last rendezvous before severing our bond—though a f*uked up one, it was a bond all the same.

“All right…” I nervously said. “I just hope this doesn’t end in a disaster.”

“I hardly think you’d see it that way, but either way, it will be for me.”

I wasn’t sure how to take his words, so I didn’t find it necessary to comment. Instead, I veered towards a different subject, one he had chosen to ignore before.

“You said you were going somewhere. Where is that, exactly?

His beautiful smile took me aback, all the while momentarily blinding me from thinking and breathing before he daringly placed a light kiss on my lips.

“This is where I want to be … kissing you.”

I was screwed, and I damn well knew it.





Chapter Twenty-Four





After that sweat-inducing line he had thrown me … Well, it took him less than sixty seconds to have my body underneath him and another second to have me scream his name in pleasure.

I remembered thinking that, whatever happened from there until the end, I knew I had done it with my eyes open. Whatever decisions I made that day, I shouldn’t regret them, because I knew what I had signed up for.

Therefore, after our quick hump session, I strolled into the bathroom to tidy myself up—the man had a way of making my hair atrociously messy while leaving such appalling red marks on my neck from his bites and heavy sucking. From the outside, it might look like I was an abuse victim, yet I wasn’t. In fact, I never had such satisfying sex, so much so that I didn’t want to think about how it made me feel complete in every sense of the word. It was a troubling thought since this would all be gone in less than a week.

I supposed his random proposition made sense because Carter wasn’t here, and since he and I had already done the dirty last night, not to mention with our palpable chemistry, it wasn’t a hard decision to make.

After sprucing myself up into a glam-less state with my less shambled state of a hair, I left the bathroom to be greeted with Brody rolling in my luggage.

Stopping in my tracks, I raised my brow at him. “Well, look at you. Already hard at work, I see.”

He sure wasn’t one to waste a precious second. Who knew the laid back guy had it in him? I sure as hell hadn’t. But, heck, like I had thought before, this wasn’t a transformed version of him. No, this was a side of him that I wasn’t accustomed to, because it had always been granted to another person. Now that the person in question was happily married to the man she loved, the spot was open, and it seemed he didn’t want to waste any time in replacing Lindsey. I supposed, in his mind, I was the best candidate. It was cruel to consider such thoughts; however, it was how I felt, so there would be no point in even denying it to myself, even if the truth stung.

Squashing my depressing thoughts, I turned back to bed, hoping my mind would be too distracted to continue thinking that way.

After situating my stuff, Brody then proceeded to seek my side of the bed, almost wedging himself on the edge of the mattress just so he could place his warm body against mine.