Interim(68)

“You do! Maybe not overtly, but you do. You always have. If there was something you didn’t like about me, you’d let me know with your little bullshit subversive comments. Sometimes I’d hear them from Casey. Pffst! Like I didn’t know you’d gone to her. Like I couldn’t figure out that you’d sent her to fix something about me that didn’t jive with your super cool persona.”

“Jive?” Brandon asked, raising his eyebrow.

“Don’t pretend you haven’t been manipulating me for years!” Regan shouted.

“I haven’t.”

“Okay then. Molding me. How’s that?”

“Molding you?”

“Yes, Brandon. Molding me. Changing me. Making me what you want me to be,” Regan replied patiently. “And I’m sick and tired of it! I’m not that girl. I’ve NEVER been that girl. I don’t take orders from boyfriends. I don’t let people boss me around. I don’t shut my mouth. I don’t let guys—”

She fell backwards onto the sand, smacking her tailbone painfully. He put her there with a hard shove.

“I didn’t mean it,” Brandon said quickly. He reached out his hand. “I forget my own strength sometimes.”

“No,” she whispered.

“Just take my hand, Regan.”

“No.”

“I’m sorry,” he whined. It was pathetic and insincere and everything she hated about him.

“No, you’re not.”

She knew it was unwise to argue. Resistance might fuel his anger even more, and then she’d walk away with a bloody nose or purple eye. The safe thing to do would be to take his hand, lie to him that everything was okay, and then sneak away when she had the opportunity. Then she could break up with him via text, and she’d never have to worry about being alone with him again. She’d be surrounded at school. She’d make sure she was never left alone at home. It could work. All she had to do was take his hand. For now.

“Get up, Regan,” Brandon ordered. He waved his hand at her impatiently.

No, she thought, raging against her feminine survival instincts.

“Fuck you,” she said, her eyes fastened on him. “I’m not touching you.”

Brandon dropped his hand in slow motion. She watched his face turn from genuine surprise to dark malice. She knew what was coming. It lay dormant in his arm muscles for three years. All he needed was a legitimate reason, and now, she’d given him one. She disobeyed. She said no.

He whipped his hands out in a flash, grabbing her upper arms before she could run away. She squealed as he hauled her to her feet. And then it happened. He slapped her—hand whipping across her cheek in a blinding sting. The sting was rife with purpose—threatening, demanding a change she was unwilling to make. Demanding a person she was unwilling to be.

The mark would pulse red for a few minutes—maybe an hour—and then disappear like it was never there. He wasn’t an idiot. He knew not to punch her. Bruises give guys like him away. But a slap is elusive, like the glimpse of garbage brought to the surface by a churned wave, only to disappear into the depths within seconds. Physical evidence erased with only the message remaining: I was here. Now try to prove it.

Regan glared at Brandon as she massaged her cheek.

“I wanna scratch your eyes out,” she hissed.

“No, you don’t,” he challenged.

“I wanna scratch your eyes out,” she repeated.

“Stop saying that.”

“I wanna scratch your eyes out!”

“Shut up, Regan!”

“I hate you! I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!” she screamed into the night air.

She let the words float along the breeze, make their way to the partygoers, who she knew were too drunk to care. But she said what she wanted to say, and that’s all that mattered.

“Can’t you understand that I love you?” Brandon yelled.

Regan snorted. “You’re f*cking crazy!”

“I didn’t mean to hit you.”

“Yes, you did! You’d been waiting to do that!”

Brandon affected shock. “Never, Regan.”

“Oh, shut up. Just shut the f*ck up! I’m leaving, and you’re not gonna put your hands on me. You’re not gonna stop me. You’re not gonna follow me. You understand?”

Brandon wouldn’t give up. She knew he wouldn’t. It was his nature to get what he wanted. Every. Single. Time.