Sweet Like Revenge

22 - Give and Take

I felt my heart beating in my chest as Matt continued to kiss me. His hands had moved from my shoulders to my waist, his grip strong and hungry. It could have been romantic, it could have felt good — if I felt anything for him. But I felt nothing.

I thought that it would be easy to kiss Matt, to pretend that he was what I wanted. I thought that it would be easy to lie. And it was — it just wasn't easy to lie to myself. Because I knew how it felt to want someone, how it felt to long for their touch. I had felt it in that very room. Just not with the boy kissing me now.

Matt's hands moved further down as he traced over my torso, and I felt my blood freeze as my brain struggled to register what was happening. A deadly chill cascaded down my spine, replacing the heat that had filled me only five minutes earlier.

I turned my face away, breaking our kiss.

Matt's face came into focus in front of mine. His brow was furrowed slightly, but that playful smile was still dancing on his lips.

"What's wrong?" he mumbled, stroking my leg with his thumb.

I fumbled for a response, motioning to the boy that was still snoring above us. "What if he wakes up?"

Matt smiled. "He won't."

I frowned. "Well, what if someone walks in on us?"

"They know not to."

They know not to?

Matt leaned forward, faster than he had before, and pressed his smile against my scowl. I tried to recoil, but he followed me back until he had me up against the bedhead, his hands desperately clasping the sides of my face and entwining in my hair.

Astor Black's face flashed in my mind. I could smell rain. I could feel a malevolent weight on top of me, but I was unable to fight back and unable to scream. It wasn't just a nightmare anymore. It was happening. Again. I was trapped against Matt's bedhead, my arms pinned inside his heavy jacket, and I still felt so, so weak.

With nothing else to do and no other way out, I bit down hard on Matt's bottom lip.

"Fuck!"

He jerked back, raising a hand to catch a falling drop of blood. His eyes darted to mine, the longing, the adoration, the lust replaced with nothing short of anger.

"What the hell?"

"I'm not ready," I answered simply.

I should have said more. I should have scolded him. Or slapped him. But I was still trapped against that bedhead, still groggy and confused, and he was so strong.

From the seething glare that Matt was giving me, I was sure that he would dismiss my resistance. I thought that, maybe, he would simply try again; third time lucky. Or maybe he would yell at me, and try to scare me into compliance. But he didn't do any of that.

Instead, Matt Mitchell laughed.

His laugh echoed through the room as he backed off of the bed. He turned, leaning against the ladder of the bunk to compose himself.

"You're not ready?" He asked. "You're not ready? Then what the hell are we doing here, Elle?"

I stared back at him, dumbfounded. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, what are we doing? What have we been doing all of this time? I thought that we had a deal."

I searched the deepest caves of my mind for even an inkling as to what Matt was talking about. "What deal?"

The football player stared at me for a moment, deep into my eyes. After a second, he exhaled, then lifted a hand to comb through his hair as he moved off of the ladder and towards Nate's bed.