I rolled my eyes. “Screw. You!”
He snidely smiled, immediately slamming on the gas and veering across the grass to block my path. He didn’t bother turning off the engine as he jumped off his bike before I even saw him coming. I pivoted around to take off in the other direction, but he was over to me in three strides, causing me to step back.
“Nowhere to go now, kitten.” He loomed over my small frame.
“First, I’m not your kitten! Second, what do you want, Tristian?”
“What the hell is your problem?”
“You!” I shoved him, and he didn’t waver, which only made me push him again. “You’re my problem! Now get out of my way!”
“I just saved you. Again. And I’m the problem?”
“I hate you! I hate you so much right now! You’re an asshole, Tristian Hawkins!”
He arched an eyebrow and smiled cunningly. “Why are you so mad, kitten? You didn’t like the show?”
I gasped. “You knew I was watching?”
He simply nodded.
“I can’t believe you did that!”
“Yeah, and I’d do it again. How’s that for hot and cold, kitten?”
“Of course, you would! That’s who you are! You don’t think for one second about me. About how much that would hurt me.”
“I thought you wanted me out of your life. I was just giving you what you demanded. You didn’t like that very much, now did you?”
I gasped again. “You’re unbelievable, asshole.”
He stepped toward me, and I instantly backed away, holding my hand out in front of me.
“Yeah! I am an asshole! But how else was I going to show you that you don’t hate me at all?”
I opened my mouth to reply, but he interrupted, “I’m going to talk, and you’re going to listen.”
My eyes widened, never expecting what he was going to say.
“I don’t give a shit that you think you hate me. I know the truth. You can’t stop thinking about me as much as I can’t stop thinking about you.”
I stared intently at his face, waiting for the next thing he was going to share.
“I know I’m an asshole. I’m not pretending to be someone I’m not. But all the shit I run away from—the emotions, the attachments, the bullshit that comes along with girls and their feelings, I wanted no part of it. Though with you, it’s been staring me right in the face since the first moment I saw you.” He paused, gazing deep into my eyes. “I wanted it. I. Wanted. You.”
Before I could answer, thunder lit the entire sky with rain quickly beginning to pour on top of our heads.
“Fuck!” he exclaimed, handing me the other helmet while throwing his on. “We have to go!”
Putting on the helmet, I hopped on the back of his bike. He didn’t waver, hitting the accelerator at full throttle, tearing through the street. It was hard to see a foot in front of us. Light post after light post flashed by us at the speed of light. I barely had time to contemplate how dangerous it was that he was driving through a thunderstorm when my gaze landed on the speedometer which read eighty-five miles per hour.
“Tristian…” I coaxed, knowing he was speeding too fast.
Call it intuition.
A sixth sense.
Whatever you wanted to define it as.