The Royals Next Door

He wouldn’t have come if he’d known I’d be here.

“. . . Monica is very grateful that you’ve been so generous.”

“So I guess this ends your two-weeks-of-avoiding-me streak.” I turn away from him and open the lid to the washer. I make a tsking sound. “And you were doing such a good job.”

He doesn’t say anything to that; instead the room seems to hum with tension. I dare to look at him, and though he’s stone-faced, there’s a spark in his eyes. The thing is, he was avoiding me. He told me he would stay away. There’s no way he can deny the truth.

I shove the clothes in the washer and slam the lid shut, straightening up to turn the dial to the right settings.

Without saying a word, Harrison starts walking off.

What the fuck?

I march over to him and grab his arm, pulling him to a stop.

“That’s it?” I ask him, feeling irate. “Now you just walk off without saying anything? Is that what you’re going to do every time you see me now?”

He turns to face me, his brow furrowed, eyes blazing. “I’m just doing what I can.” His voice is rough, borderline angry. Why is he angry? I’m the one who is angry here.

“You don’t have to be a dick about it.”

“How am I being a dick?” he snaps.

“You had no business telling me all those things you told me,” I say, and I hate how shaky my voice is and how vulnerable I feel. I fold my arms across my chest, as if I can protect myself that way. “You said some of the sweetest, nicest things that anyone has ever said to me; you told me that you liked me. And then you walked away and stayed away, just as you’re trying to do now. Is this how it’s going to be? For how long?”

“For as long as I’m here,” he says gruffly. His jaw muscles clench, and I can tell how badly he wants to leave. But I won’t let him go easily.

“Oh really. So, for at least the next six months, you’re going to just pretend I don’t exist? Why?”

His eyes narrow, nostrils flare. “You know why.”

“I don’t. I don’t, okay? You gave me some vague mumbo jumbo about me deserving better and if you were a lesser man you’d lose control and that you can’t afford to feel the way you do about me. Well? Do you feel something still or not? Has it gone away? Has it magically disappeared because you haven’t seen me? Out of sight, out of mind, is that how easy it is to forget me?”

He presses his lips together in a hard line and looks away.

“Hey,” I tell him, taking a step closer, until I’m right up against him and really in his face, about impossible to ignore as I’ll ever be. “Now you’re just being rude. Look at me.”

With reluctance, his eyes meet mine, and they’re as intense as I’ve seen them, burning, practically smoldering.

“I’ll say it again, okay? You don’t get to tell me nice things and then act like it never happened. You don’t get to pretend that I don’t exist. I don’t know what we have between us, but there is something between us. You said as much yourself. Maybe it scares you, but it scares me too, and yet I’m not about to pretend it doesn’t exist or that it isn’t real. I just . . .” I shake my head, surprised that I’m still talking, that I’m going there. “You said you’d be a lesser man if you kissed me. I think you’re a lesser man for running away.”

His nostrils flare at that. It’s a sore spot.

And I decide to poke at it again.

“You need to fucking man up,” I add snidely.

Something in his eyes snaps. The greens and blues ignite, and I know I’ve crossed a line that I can’t come back from.

It happens so fast, there’s no time to blink.

The space between us disintegrates, and then his hands cup my face, his fingers pressing into my skin as his lips crash angrily against mine.

I’m still so full of fire that it takes me a moment to realize what’s happening, that it’s his mouth on mine, hard and soft all at once and unrelenting in his pursuit. His hands are large and warm, and it’s not just that they hold me in place—they pull me to him, until I’m unsteady on my feet. I feel like I’m standing precipitously on a rock that juts out into an ocean storm, waves crashing on either side of me. I have a choice to surrender to the chaos or head back to shore.

I choose to surrender.

My mouth opens against his, my hands grasping his shirt in a ravenous, delirious way, as if I’d been starving all this time and only realized it now. Heat floods through me, like stepping into warm, sweet bathwater, and I make the fists in his shirt tighter, as if that will give me some control.