Page 72 of Oliver
"Whatever's eating at you, I won't be a tool for you to avoid it." I kept my voice steady, even as my hands trembled against his shirt. I'd spent too many years letting Ryan use me. I wouldn't let that happen again, especially not withhim.
Oliver let out a slow exhale, stepping back, his jaw tight. But when he spoke, his voice wasn’t defensive. It was soft. Raw.
"I shouldn’t have let him touch you."
I flinched. Not at the words, but at the heavy guilt behind them.
"I wasn’t scared of Ryan, Oliver," I said carefully. "I never was."
He let out a dry laugh, no humor in it. "Yeah? Then why did you stay?"
The words cut deep, slicing through the carefully stitched-up wounds I'd spent years pretending weren’t there.
I clenched my fists, staring at the floor. "You wouldn’t understand."
"Try me."
Memories refused to form into words, old wounds bleeding into new ones. I felt him waiting, his breath uneven, his pulse hammering.
Then a disdainful exhale. “He's such a predictable bully. I bet he only ever fucked you in cowgirl, making you do all the work while he just lay there."
The words were cruel. A casual, offhanded stab.
The bitter laugh escaped before I could stop it.
"Cowgirl would have been giving me too much control." The words tumbled out, honest and ugly. "Ryan preferred doggy so he could shove my face into the mattress to remind me who's stronger."
The air in the room changed. Oliver went deadly still, like I’d just sucked all the oxygen from the room.
And then—before I could even wrap my head around the truth I’d revealed—his fist slammed into the wall.
The sound cracked through the air, splintering like the drywall under his knuckles.
I gasped, stepping forward instinctively, but Oliver jerked away, breathing hard, his entire body vibrating with something dark and untethered.
"Jesus, Zahra, I—" His voice was wrecked, torn at the edges. He turned his head, like he couldn’t look at me, his hands fisted at his sides, shaking with something barely contained as blood dripped from his wounded knuckles. "Just say the word, and I’ll make sure tonight will be his last on this planet."
His voice was hoarse, his breath uneven, his entire being coiled with something I’d never seen in him before. A different kind of anger. One that wasn’t cold and calculated like the Oliver I knew.
This was rage. This was personal.
And the strangest part? I wasn’t afraid.
Not of him. Never of him.
I took a slow step forward, my voice barely above a whisper, and placed my hand on his chest. “Just…don’t disappear like that again, okay?”
His eyes snapped to mine, something cracking open in his gaze—somethinggutturalandraw—and his hand lifted, hesitated, then settled over mine where it pressed against his chest.
His heartbeat was wild. Unsteady.
"I shouldn't have…" His voice was gruff, tired. "I drove past their house. My grandparents' house. It's abandoned. Overgrown. Like they never existed."
I stilled, remembering how close Oliver had been to his grandparents, how he'd spoken of them with such love, such reverence.
His fingers squeezed the bridge of his nose, a sharp exhale shuddering through him. "And it's my fault." His voice cracked. "I let them take everything. I left them to rot. I…"
The breath he let out was shattering.
