Ugly Love

I already know it’s not Miles, because the knock at my door belongs to Chad and Tarryn. They’re the only friends I’ve made here, as busy as I am, and they’re only my friends because we’re in study group together.

Which is why they’re knocking on my door right now.

I open it, and Chad is standing in the doorway sans Tarryn.

“Where’s Tarryn?”

“She got called in to cover a shift,” he says. “She can’t make it tonight.”

I hold the door open further to let him in. As soon as he steps over the threshold, Miles opens his apartment door across the hall. He freezes when our eyes meet.

He holds me captive with his stare for several seconds until his gaze slides over my shoulder and lands on Chad.

I glance at Chad, who looks at me and arches an eyebrow. He can apparently tell something’s up, so he respectfully retreats into my apartment. “I’ll be in your room, Tate,” he says.

That’s nice of Chad … offering to give me privacy with the guy across the hall. However, announcing that he’ll be waiting in my bedroom probably wasn’t the respect Miles wanted to be shown, because now he’s stepping back inside his apartment.

His eyes drop to the floor right before he closes his door.

The look on his face sends pangs of guilt straight to my stomach. I have to remind myself that this was his choice. I have nothing to feel guilty about, even if he is misjudging the situation he just opened his door to.

I close the front door and join Chad in my room. The silent pep talk I tried to give myself did nothing to ease the guilt. I sit on the bed, and he sits at the desk. “That was weird,” he says, eyeing me. “I’m a little scared to leave your apartment now.”

I shake my head. “Don’t worry about Miles. He has issues, but they aren’t my issues anymore.”

Chad nods and doesn’t question me any further. He opens the study guide and lays it across his lap as he props his feet up on the bed.

“Tarryn already made notes for chapter two, so if you get three, I’ll cover four.”

“Deal,” I say. I scoot back against my pillow and spend the next hour preparing notes for chapter three, but I have no idea how I manage to concentrate, because the only thing I can think about is the look that crossed Miles’s face right before he closed the door. I could tell I hurt him.

That makes us even now, I guess.

After Chad and I exchange notes and answer the study questions at the end of every chapter, I make copies on my printer. I realize three people divvying up three chapters and sharing answers is cheating, but who the hell cares? I never claimed to be perfect.

Once we’re finished, I walk Chad back out. I can tell he’s a little bit nervous after having seen the look on Miles’s face earlier, so I wait for him to get on the elevator before I close the apartment door. To be honest, I was a little nervous for him, too.

I walk to the kitchen and begin making a plate of leftovers. There’s no point in cooking, since Corbin won’t be home until late tonight. Before I’m finished adding food to my plate, the front door opens with a knock.

Miles is the only one who opens the door and knocks at the same time.

Calm down.

Calm down, calm down, calm down.

Calm the hell down, Tate!

“Who was that?” Miles asks from behind me.

I don’t even turn around. I continue making my plate of food as if his being here after weeks of silence isn’t filling me with a storm of emotions. Anger being the most prominent one.

“He’s in my class,” I say. “We were studying.”

I can feel the tension rolling off him, and I’m not even facing him. “For three hours?”

I spin around and face him, but the expletives I want to scream get caught in my throat when I see him. He’s standing in the doorway to the kitchen, gripping the door frame over his head. I can tell he hasn’t worked in a few days, because his jaw is lined with a thin layer of stubble. He’s barefoot, and his shirt has risen up with his arms, revealing that V.

At first, I stare at him.

Then I yell at him.

“If I want to screw a guy in my bedroom for three hours, then good for me! You aren’t at all entitled to have an opinion about what goes on in my life. You’re a jerk, and you have serious issues, and I don’t want to be a part of them anymore.”

I’m lying. I really do want to be a part of his issues. I want to immerse myself in his issues and become his issues, but I’m supposed to be this independent, headstrong girl who doesn’t cave just because she likes a guy.

His eyes are narrowed, and his breaths are coming hard and fast. He drops his arms and walks swiftly to me, grabbing my face, forcing me to look up at him.

His eyes are frantic, and knowing that he’s scared that I’ve moved on feels way too good. He waits several seconds before speaking, allowing his eyes to roam over my face. His thumbs brush lightly across my cheekbones, and his hands feel protective and good, and I absolutely hate that I want them everywhere right now. I don’t like who he turns me into.

“Are you sleeping with him?” he asks, finally resting his eyes on mine as they search for truth.

That’s none of your business, Miles.

“No,” I say instead.

“Have you kissed him?”

Still not your business, Miles.

“No.”

He closes his eyes and exhales, relieved. He drops his hands to the bar on either side of me and lowers his forehead to my shoulder.

He doesn’t ask me another question.

He’s hurting, but I don’t know what the hell to do about it. He’s the only one who can change things between us, and as far as I know, he’s still not willing to do that.

“Tate,” he says in a pained whisper. His face moves to my neck, and one of his hands grips my waist. “Dammit, Tate.” His other hand moves to the back of my head as his lips rest against the skin of my neck. “What do I do?” he whispers. “What the fuck do I do?”

I squeeze my eyes shut, because the confusion and pain in his voice are unbearable. I shake my head. I shake it because I don’t know how to answer a question that I don’t even know the meaning behind. I also shake my head because I don’t know how to physically push him away.

His lips meet the spot just below my ear, and I want to pull him closer and push him as far away as I can. His mouth continues to move across my skin, and I feel my neck tilting so that he can find even more of me to kiss. His fingers tangle in my hair as he grips the back of my head to hold me still against his mouth.

“Make me leave,” he says, his voice pleading and warm against my throat. “You don’t need this.” He’s kissing his way up my throat, breaking for breath only when he speaks. “I just don’t know how to stop wanting you. Tell me to go, and I’ll go.”

I don’t tell him to go. I shake my head. “I can’t.”

I turn my face toward his just as he’s worked his way up to my mouth, then I grab his shirt and pull him to me, knowing exactly what I’m doing to myself. I know this time won’t end any prettier than the other times, but I still want it just as much. If not more.

He pauses and looks me hard in the eyes. “I can’t give you more than this,” he whispers as a warning. “I just can’t.”

I hate him for saying that but respect it just the same.

I respond by pulling him closer until our lips meet. We open our mouths at the exact same time and completely devour each other. We’re frantic, pulling at each other, moaning, digging into each other’s skin.

Sex, I remind myself. It’s just sex. Nothing more. He’s not giving me any other part of him.

I can tell myself that all I want, but at the same time, I’m taking, taking, taking as much as I can get. Deciphering every sound he makes and every touch, attempting to convince myself that what he’s giving me is so much more than what it probably is.

I’m a fool.

At least I’m a self-aware fool.

I unbutton his jeans, and he unfastens my bra, and before we’re even in my bedroom, my shirt is off. Our mouths never separate as he shuts my door, then yanks off my bra. He pushes me onto the bed and pulls off my jeans, then stands and removes his own.

It’s a race.

It’s Miles and me against everything else.

We’re racing our consciences, our pride, our respect, the truth. He’s trying to get inside me before any of the rest of that stuff catches up to us.

As soon as he’s back on the bed, he’s over me, against me, then inside me.

We win.

His mouth finds mine again, but that’s all it does. He doesn’t kiss me. Our lips touch and our breath collides and our eyes meet, but there isn’t a kiss.

What our mouths are doing is so much more than that. With every thrust inside me, his lips slide over mine, and his eyes grow hungrier, but he never once kisses me.

A kiss is so much easier than what we’re doing. When you kiss, you can close your eyes. You can kiss away the thoughts. You can kiss away the pain, the doubt, the shame. When you close your eyes and kiss, you protect yourself from the vulnerability.

This isn’t us protecting ourselves.

This is confrontation. This is a standoff. This is eye-to-eye combat. This is a dare, from me to Miles, from Miles to me. I dare you to try to stop this, we’re both silently screaming.

His eyes remain focused on mine the entire time as he moves in and out of me. With each thrust, I hear his words from just a few short weeks ago repeat in my head.

It’s easy to confuse feelings and emotions for something they aren’t, especially when eye contact is involved.

I completely understand now. I understand so well I almost wish he’d close his eyes, because he’s more than likely not feeling what his eyes are showing me right now.

“You feel so good,” he whispers. The words fall into my mouth, forcing moans out of me in reciprocation. He lowers his right hand between us, placing pressure against me in a way that would normally cause my head to fall backward and my eyes to fall shut.

Not this time. I’m not backing down from this confrontation. Especially not when he’s staring straight into my eyes, defying his own words.

Even though I refuse to back down, I do let him know I like what he’s doing to me. I can’t help but let him know that, because I don’t have control over my voice right now. It’s possessed by a girl who thinks she wants this from him.

“Don’t stop,” my voice says, becoming more possessed by him the longer this continues.

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

He applies more pressure, both inside and outside me. He grabs my leg behind the knee and pulls it up between our chests, finding a slightly different angle to enter me. He holds my leg firmly against his shoulder and somehow thrusts into me even deeper.

“Miles. Oh, my God.” I moan his name and God’s name and even shout out to Jesus a couple of times. I begin to shudder beneath him, and I’m not sure which one of us broke down first, but we’re kissing now. We’re kissing as hard and as deep as his thrusts inside me.

He’s loud. I’m louder.

I’m shaking. He’s shaking harder.

He’s out of breath. I’m inhaling enough for both of us.

He pushes into me one final time and holds me firmly against the mattress with his weight. “Tate,” he says, moaning my name against my mouth as his body recovers from the tremors. “Fuck, Tate.” He slowly pulls out of me and presses his cheek against my chest. “Holy shit,” he breathes. “It’s so good. This. Us. So fucking good.”

“I know.”

He rolls onto his side and keeps his arm draped across me. We lie together quietly.

Me—not wanting to admit that I just let him use me again.

Him—not wanting to admit that it was more than just sex.

Both of us lying to ourselves.

“Where’s Corbin?” he asks.

“He’ll be home later tonight.”

He lifts his head and looks down at me, his brows furrowed in a line of worry. “I should go.” He rolls off the bed and pulls his jeans back on. “Come over later?”

I nod as I stand up and slide into my own jeans. “Grab my shirt from the kitchen,” I tell him. I pull on my bra and fasten it. He opens my bedroom door, but he doesn’t walk out. He pauses in the doorway. He’s looking at someone.

Shit.

I don’t have to see him to know that Corbin is standing there. I immediately rush to the door to stop whatever’s about to happen. When I hold it open further, Corbin is standing in his doorway across the hall, glaring at Miles.

I make the first move. “Corbin, before you say anything—”