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You are worth every kiss my lips can steal. — _hydrus
“You’re telling me Holden Sykes, campus playboy, and literal golden retriever, is a closet emo?”
I’m floored to realize…yeah, I’m jealous. Of some twat-waffle who has nothing to offer Phoenix that I can’t give him myself. The epiphany smacks me clear in the face, and it’s enough to have me releasing him.
I shake my head, my breathing coming out in heaving pants against his lips. “Hold—” “Don’t you dare,” he whispers harshly while tightening his hold on my hip. “You’re not ending this now. I’m not fucking done with you.” Then he crashes his mouth back to mine, and I drown all over again.
Fuck if he thinks he’s getting out of my grasp right now. He’ll be lucky if I ever let him out of reach ever again, especially when it took this long to get him here in the first place.
“I want both,” he finally says slowly, fingers dancing down my bicep. “I want you to drive me to the brink of insanity only to stop and let me return the favor.”
I’m high on sunshine, tequila, and him; a combination sure to decimate the willpower of even the strongest of men. Something I’ve never been, nor will ever claim to be.
Because now I can’t unsee the look in his eyes. The honesty and vulnerability in them is disarming. “And I can’t just be your friend, Nix. I don’t know how.”
I’m going to Hell for this. But fuck, the road to Hell has never tasted so sweet.
“Do what you want to me, baby. Do your fucking worst.”
I swallow down those little sounds, taking them for myself. After all, they belong to me. He belongs to me.
Just being in his presence has this strange sort of calming effect on me. One I haven’t felt with anyone except my parents, honestly. And my Gran.
“Well, if that’s the case, I don’t feel very sad or lonely right now.”
“I normally like to be in the pit for the heavier songs.”
Me. Too.
“And just so we’re clear, Nash Kaelin might be a god amongst men, but all that means is he’d never get on his knees for you the way I do.”
That’s the beautiful thing about the metal community. Nothing matters once the artists take the stage, because you become one with the crowd, the music, and the experience.
🖤🖤🖤
And as if reading my thoughts, he quietly adds, “I’ll always protect the ones I care about. However I can.”
“I guess I should be honored that you’d punch someone for me, then.”
Let him mark me, brand me, stake his claim. I’m already his. I have been since the night I laid eyes on him—maybe even before then. All I know is it’s been far longer than either of us realize.
The smile I felt against my lips only grows at my agreement, yet what really does something stupid to the slab of meat in my chest is the way his hand curls around the back of my neck and he kisses me. As if all he wanted was a yes. As if all he wants is me.
Something about him lightens the air around me. Makes me feel like I can breathe again, even through all the shit plaguing my thoughts.
My heart lurches at his name, and I’m starting to see I really am fucked when it comes to this guy. Head over heels, nothing-and-no-one-compares level fucked.
He’s everything I didn’t know I wanted, and now I doubt there will ever be a day when he isn’t.
It’s the kind of love that only comes once in a lifetime. The one worth breaking all the rules for.
“Don’t, what? Don’t love you? Because it’s a little too fucking late for that, baby.”
It’s silent, but it might as well make a sonic boom as it meets my skin. Or maybe that’s the sound of my heart shattering on impact. Because there is no worse pain on the planet than watching the person you love fall apart before your eyes, knowing you’re helpless to stop it. He’s not going to survive this. Not unless I take some of the pain or the fault or the choice for him.
“I’m yours, Nix. Always. You have to know that. So choose you, baby. ‘Cause I’m choosing you too.”
I press my lips to his forehead and walk away. Because I’ll always choose him. Even if he can’t. Even if it tears me apart in the process.
“You’ve always been my number one, but it’s time I’m my own number one, Kase.” I scrub the back of my neck awkwardly. “I fell in love with Holden. No matter how much sense it doesn’t make, no matter if it all blows up in my face, I love him. He looks like the rest of my life, and I’ll never forgive myself if I throw that away. Not for you, not for anyone.”
He’s the person I want to talk to every waking moment of the day. The person I want to punch people for at concerts or curl in bed with and study the steadiness of his heartbeat. When I look at him, I see what my parents have. The kind of love that negates odds or logic.
He brings me a sense of peace I haven’t known since my parents were alive, and I don’t want to live without it anymore.
“Out of all the lies I’ve told through this entire mess, telling you I didn’t love you was the biggest one of all. There’s nothing and no one I want more than you,” he murmurs, fingers scraping against the back of my head. “I love you, baby. And I’m so fucking sorry for making you think otherwise.”
“I’m just glad your eyes finally match your mouth.” “Because I meant it, Holden.” His eyes dart between mine. “Until the day you decide you don’t want me, I’m yours.”
I close the distance between us and anchor my hand at the back of his neck, knowing myself well enough to see where this is going next. Knowing exactly what I’d do—drunk or not—at this moment. Slanting my mouth over his, I kiss him like he’s the only thing in existence. Like he is the air that fills my lungs, and the reason the sun rises, and is in every beat my heart takes. Because he is.
“I love you, Nix,” I whisper between each kiss I plant on his lips. “I love you so fucking much.” One of those addictive laughs leaves him as his nose brushes mine. “That definitely isn’t part of the plot ‘til much, much later. But I love you too.”
“I want every moment we’ve ever had, no matter how messy. No matter how heartbreaking or fucked-up or stolen they might’ve been. I want all the pieces of our history, because those moments are what make us us.”
