Page 114 of Drown Like Heaven
He leaned into my hand harder, pinning it against the door handle.
“You said you would tell me what’s wrong if I came in here with you,” I reminded him, pressing another kiss to his mouth, trying to ignore the discomfort in my fingers. “I want to know.” And Idid. I did want to know; I wanted to fix it for him if I could.
I’m trying to be what you need. I know something’s wrong and I’m fucking trying to be here for you. Don’t do this.
“I want to know who your professors are.” He moved his lips down over my jaw, the touch deceptively gentle, almost like he wanted to trick me into giving in to him, to make me forget all the other shit he was doing to me. But I could feel my pulse throbbing in my fingertips, trapped beneath Mason’s.
“You don’t need to know.”
His body was positioned over mine now, cornering me in my seat. His skin was so hot and the heated air was still coming out of the vents and I felt like I couldn’t breathe.
“I do need to know,” he growled, anger slipping into his tone.
Please don’t do this.
Let me help you. Tell me what’s wrong. Stop trying to force me to give you this answer. It doesn’t matter.
My fingers were getting crushed against the door handle and I couldn’t wrench my hand free, even when I tried. Tears sprung up in my eyes as I glared at Mason, teeth gritted, pain shooting through the bones of my hand. But I didn’t want to tell him it hurt, didn’t want to tell him to stop.
I wanted to survive him.
We weren’t healthy together. The worst sort of pairing. He’d hurt me and I’d let him. I’d even beg him to take itfurther. I liked the pain.
But this wasn’t like all the other times he’d pushed me, tried to get me to open up to him. I could see it in the darkness of his eyes, feel it in the way he was leaning into my hand harder.
Like he was trying tohurtme.
For real.
Like he was fucking pissed at me.
And I had no idea what I’d done to deserve that.
“Mason. Stop.”
He was kissing me again, but I wasn’t kissing him back, my heart slamming painfully on my ribcage. I tried to turn my head away, to get out from under him. I couldn’t be whoever he needed me to be right now. I needed to breathe. The air in the car kept getting hotter and hotter, suffocating me.
“Stop,” I said louder.
You’re hurting me.
“Give me an answer and I will.”
“I don’t need to tell you shit!” My voice was frantic.
He put more of his weight into the arm holding him up, crunching my hand on the door handle. The back of my neck was sweating, hairs sticking to my skin. I had no idea why he was so stuck on this but I wished he’d drop it, wished he would justbe honest with me for once. Wished he would act like he cared about me again.
I twisted my body around, bending my knees up while trying to shove away from him, heavy boots kicking into his torso. My hand was throbbing with pain.
“Get the fuck off of me!”
But he didn’t move a single inch, like he was made of stone. Stronger than any human should’ve been. It struck that same deep chord of fear inside of me that I’d felt the first day, in the ocean.
I stopped fighting.
A cold trickle of primal fear slithered under my skin, an intrinsic feeling ofwrongnessabout him.
He didn’t care about me.
