Page 80 of Make Me Bleed
“Abel.”
I shake my head, refusing him, and swallow past the lump in my throat. Peris reaches across and drags his thumb over my jaw, across the stubble that has formed there, until he reaches my pulse point, which is just hammering away at this point.
“You’re nervous,” he states the obvious, and I almost snort. “Why?”
“Because you make me fucking nervous,” I snap.
“Nothing makes you nervous, Abel,” he says easily, and that makes me want to cry.
“Is that what you think?” I ask, finally looking up at him. When our eyes meet, I can finally breathe again, and ithurts.“You think I’m not affected by anything?”
Peris’s brows furrow. “You don’t act like it.”
“Well, of course, I don’tactlike it. I’m good at pretending. But out of anything and everything in this world, you affect me like nothing else. You make mecrazy,Peris.”
This makes his lips twitch, and I roll my eyes. “Crazy, huh?”
“Certifiable.”
“Good to know,” he muses, dragging his fingers over his lips as he contemplates.
“I’m sure it is,” I quip back, rolling my eyes as I pick up my mug to take a drink of the now tepid tea. But it’s still good, so I don’t care. Peris seems to have forgotten about his, so I tap his wrist to get his attention.
“What?”
“Your tea,” I remind him, and he just…looksat me. His golden-green eyes stare right into me, piercing me to the point I start to shift on my feet as I grow uncomfortable. “What the fuck are you staring at?” I snap, and finally,finally,he smirks, his face shifting into something less serious.
“I’m sitting in your apartment, drinking fuckingtea,” Peris snipes, starting to laugh, and I raise a brow at him. His laughs grow deeper and longer until eventually, he abandons his mug entirely and he’s bent over, clutching his stomach and laughing deeply and loudly. I can’t help but join in, the sound of his laughter too contagious not to follow.
I’m not sure how long it goes on for, but by the time it begins to slow, my chest and stomach are aching, and my face hurts from smiling so hard. Tears are leaking down my face, and I swipe them away absentmindedly. “Oh, fuck,” I wheeze, clutching my stomach.
“We’re fucking crazy,” he concedes in a few short pants of breath, and I snort.
“Always have been.”
“I never thought…” he starts and then cuts himself off, and the tension in the room grows imperceptibly. I look past his head, unable to meet his eyes as the sick feeling returns to my stomach at the rapid changes happening in the conversation.
“Runt.”
“What?” I ask, voice quiet, honest to God afraid of what he could day.
His hands clutch the counter, knuckles turning white under the force. “What are we doing?”
I absorb his words, but I have no clue what to say. “I never know what we’re doing, baby boy.”
Peris sucks in a breath at my slip of his nickname, and I watch the muscles in his jaw flutter as he flexes them. “Sorry,” I mutter, knowing he hates it, even though it kills me.
“Don’t be,” he breathes out, and my heart stops—literally. I feel the harsh thump as it stops beating for the rush of two seconds.
I blow out a breath and blink rapidly against the sting in my eyes as I force myself to look away from him. “I don’t know about you, but I am way too sober right now.” I chuckle to try to lighten the mood, and then, I shove away from the counter, wincing at the scrape of the stool against the floor and make my way to the balcony.
“Abel,” Peris starts, but I ignore him as I rush outside and grab one of the roaches and light it. I only get one small hit before my arm is being jerked downward and I have an angry looking Peris glaring down at me.
“What?” I gripe, feeling indignant.
“Don’t,” is all he says, but it’s thewayhe says it that makes me pause. I look up into his shadowed eyes and see more thanhis flash of anger. I see hollow sadness and disappointment and it’s that, that makes me flick the roach over the rail with a sigh.
“All right,” I concede, and when I try to drop down into one of the chairs, Peris wraps his fingers around my bicep.
