Page 76 of Ace My Heart

He barked out an angry laugh. “I don’t owe you my secrets, Mel.”

I took a step back, shocked. “What?”

“You aren’t entitled to know every little thing about me! You don’t get to push, and push, and keep pushing until I …” He dropped his forehead into his hand, thumb and finger massaging his temples.

Irrational fury raged inside me. “Oh, well, while we’re on the subject of ‘pushing’,” I snarled, “youdon’t get to pushmeeither!”

“What are you talking about?” he asked wearily, dropping his hand to his side. He looked … tired.

“I’m … I mean …” I stammered, then cleared my throat. “I mean, you keep doing … things to me, and …” I looked away, embarrassment scorching across my scalp.

“What things?” His voice was hoarse. “You mean, this sort of thing?”

He took a step closer to me. I took a step back, but his hand snaked around and pressed me to him. My nose was against his chest. I inhaled – woodsy aftershave and warm skin. My legs turned to jelly, his hand on my back the only thing holding me up.

I tilted my face up. His gaze seared me, his lips slightly parted. A little crease furrowed his dark brows, but his eyes were cobalt fire.

One palm held me still, the other slid up the side of my neck, tangling into my hair.

“Do you feel ‘pushed’ right now, Mel?” he whispered.

I bit my lip. Iwantedto feel pushed. I wanted him to push me against the wall. I wanted his tongue pushing into my mouth. Iwanted that muscular thigh of his pushing between my knees, forcing my legs apart. I wanted him to push my t-shirt up, knead my breasts with those long fingers. I wanted …

“Don’t,” I pleaded. “Please don’t.”

Joel’s Adam’s Apple bobbed as he swallowed. His lips pressed together, thinning. He untangled his hand from my hair and the pressure of his hand on my back disappeared.

“I’m sorry, Mel.”

I couldn’t respond. I turned and fled, grabbing my bag and running. Out of the room. Out of the hotel.

I wasn’t sure it would ever be far enough to subdue these feelings. He pushed me but I was pulled to him.

I can’t let this happen.

I couldn’t sleep. When I’d returned to our apartment, it had been empty. Hours later, Joel still hadn’t returned.

Something big was going on with him, but he wouldn’t talk to me. Something was going on with us, but I couldn’t think about that right now.

I wanted to text him. Just to be sure that he was okay. But I stopped myself. Fear sat like a stone in the pit of my stomach. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know exactly what he was doing tonight. But I thought I might have had a good idea.

I got my answer at about two AM. The apartment door clicked open, then closed. Muffled, slurred words – Joel. Relief turned me boneless. But then, his words were met by a giggle. A high-pitched giggle that was way too feminine to be Joel.

The knot in my stomach swelled, until it was pushing up into my rib cage, squeezing the air out of my lungs.

I crawled deeper under my blankets, pressing my pillow around my ears as the bedroom door next to mine snicked closed, but it didn’t shut out his low chuckle, and that grating, squeaky giggle on the other side of the wall.

I had no right to feel the way I did. I had no claim on Joel, and Ididn’t want one either. Yes, I felt things with him, but that was an itch I was never, ever going to scratch. It would be disastrous.

But I also didn’t want him to be in the room beside mine, murmuring and moaning and making some other girl cry out, while I had to listen. I didn’t want that at all.

“Bit too much to drink last night?” I asked Joel coldly as the plane reached cruising height and he unbuckled his seat belt.

“Something like that,” he muttered, cracking open the complimentary peanuts and tipping half the packet into his mouth.

“Any hole in a storm,” I commented, grabbing the in-flight magazine out of the holder and leafing through it as if I could read Italian.

“Any … what?”