A small smile broke his lips, but he quickly rolled his mouth, squashing it.
“Pablo Neruda used the color green because he said it was the color of hope,” I mused.
He paused. “And?”
“Do you like Pablo Neruda?”
Another long moment.
“I don’t know who the fuck that is.” A cold look iced his face. Blank. I was starting to wonder if that bored contempt was a mask. Beginning to wonder what else this lonely boy was hiding from the world.
“Liar,” I said.
His eyes popped just as I slammed a hand over my mouth. I was also beginning to wonder if I had a fucking death wish. His hands engulfed mine in a death grip, prying them away from my face.
“Do you really have a death wish, Snitch?” he echoed my thoughts.
“I don’t know why I keep breaking the rules,” I admitted. “I never once looked another Crowne in the eye, never once raised my eyes, never once spoke out of turn…until you.”
“Lucky me,” he gritted. “First you impersonate the love of my life, then you, I don’t know? Did you think I’d finally fuck you if you stood there desperate and naked?”
My eyes grew. “That wasn’t what I was doing—I would never—”
He laughed. “In case you haven’t figured it out, Snitch, I’ve had enough pathetic girls for a lifetime.”
My cheeks flamed. “Yeah, and you haven’t fucked any of them.”
His eyes flashed, the grip on my wrists becoming a vise.
Oh my God.
I was going insane.
I tried to backtrack. “I just…you have girls lining up around the block to be in your bed. And you’re not bad at it…I mean…from what I can tell.”
Grayson couldn’t be afraid; he couldn’t be ashamed, could he? There’s no way he knows shame like I do. It doesn’t burn him…does it? Does he throw fuel on the fire even when water is readily available?
“Are you ashamed?” I hedged, apparently suicidal.
“Yes,” he said. “And now you’re the only one who knows, the only one I can trust.” His voice was pleading, but his eyes gleamed sharp and mocking. “Is that what you wanted to hear, Snitch? That you’re special?”
He pulled my arms above my head, backed me up with
the force of his grip on my wrists, until I slammed into the wall beside the open ocean window.
Grayson pressed his body into mine, molding us together, then dragged his hands down my body. I kept my arms in the air. I couldn’t move. His touch was tender, almost loving, as if memorizing my curves through the fabric.
“Until recently, no one was worthy enough to have my cock inside them.”
He left no section of me unexplored. My hips, my ribs, even the curve of my elbow. I couldn’t breathe when his lips came to the underside of my jaw.
“You’re not worthy, Snitch,” he said. “You’re expendable.”
I swallowed air at his cruel, crude words. Heat and shame rushed through my body, inescapable partners.
He stepped back, unaffected. “We have a party to attend. Didn’t you say you’d learn everything about the girl I actually fucking want?”
Fourteen