Bad Romeo (14 page)

I can see him trying not to be scared, but he is. For a moment, I think he’s going to run. His body goes rigid while a flash of panic lights his eyes. Then he exhales, and I see Romeo emerge, intense and desperate. He’s channeling his emotions into the character. Using the fear. Transforming it.

I look at him through Juliet’s eyes, and he’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.

Yesterday afternoon we were screaming at each other. But now …

Now, he’s everything.

We move toward each other. My skin is alive with fluttering excitement. My body, filled with expectation. His eyes burn into mine, deep and intense. When he stops in front of me, I can barely breathe.

He’s looking at me like I’m beautiful. Like I’m some miracle of nature that was made just for him.

I need to touch him, to feel that he’s real and here and wants me, but I know Juliet wouldn’t. So I stand there and drink him in. His strong jaw and high cheekbones. His beautiful eyes and riotous hair.

All his parts have their own unique beauty, but when they’re added together, he’s magnificent beyond my ability to describe.

The fear is still in his eyes, lurking, but he pushes through it. His hand comes up to my face. He touches me gently, but my reaction is intense. His eyelids flutter as he strokes my cheek. There’s heat under my skin, and it builds with every soft pass of his fingers. His fear peeks out a little more, flickering behind his resolve.

His attention is fixed on my mouth, and he clears his throat before he murmurs, “If I profane with my unworthiest hand this holy shrine, the gentle fine is this: My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand to smooth that rough touch … with a tender kiss.”

The words are formal and archaic, yet the way my body reacts to them is timeless.

His fingers are still on my cheek as he leans down, slowly. All I can see are his lips, parted and soft. I know that Juliet would pull away, but I don’t want to.

I remember my purpose and remove his hand from my face. I hold it and softly stroke his fingers.

“Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, which mannerly devotion shows in this; for saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch. And palm to palm … is holy palmers’ kiss.”

I press our hands together, and my voice is airy. My rhythm’s off. I can’t think straight. He’s so close I can smell him—soap, and cologne. The sweet scent of chocolate on his breath.

I can feel him in every part of me, and my hands tremble.

He brings his other hand up to cover mine, then caresses it. The soft hush of skin moving against skin is the most intimate thing I’ve ever experienced. The intense current that passes between our hands shimmers in my blood.

It must affect him as well, because his voice becomes low and quiet. “Have not saints lips, and holy palmers, too?”

I can feel the vibration of his voice against my face.

“Ay, pilgrim,” I answer, as he caresses and weaves his fingers between mine, stroking the soft skin there and making me shudder. “Lips that they must use in prayer.”

“O, then, dear saint,” he says, focusing on my mouth again, “let lips do what hands do; they pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.”

The intensity of his energy is filling me up. I barely have enough air to speak.

“Saints do not move,” I whisper, “though grant for prayers’ sake.”

“Then move not,” he murmurs as he moves closer, “while my prayer’s effect I take. Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purged.”

I hold my breath as his lips get lower, suspended above mine, so far away from where I want them to be. I’m just about to close my eyes and savor the moment when he stops. He blinks and shakes his head. His grip tightens on my hands.

Ethan, no.

He squeezes his eyes shut and makes a frustrated, strangled noise.

“Mr. Holt?” Erika calls from the auditorium. “That’s your cue to kiss her. Is there a problem?”

He drops my hands and steps back. The fear he was trying so hard to suppress has broken free. It fills his expression and bunches his muscles.

“I told you I couldn’t,” he says, his voice is tight with panic. “I told you both.”

“Mr. Holt?”

He shakes his head and shoves his hands in his pockets. Shoulders hunched. “Why does no one ever fucking listen to me?”

He strides off into the wings, and although Erika calls after him, he doesn’t stop.

I start to follow, but Erika motions for me to wait.

“Cassie,” she says as she comes onstage to join me, “be careful with him. He clearly associates emotional intimacy with painful consequences, and it’s possibly a trigger for much deeper issues. I have no doubt he can do this role, but he needs to be convinced. Realistically, you’re the only one who can help him.”

“I don’t know about that. Our usual form of communication is screaming at each other.”

She smiles. “Haven’t you noticed you’re the only person in the whole class he makes an effort with? He barely talks to anyone else.”

I feel bad that I hadn’t realized how alone Holt is. At lunchtime he disappears when I sit with Connor and Miranda. After class when everyone else is leaving and chatting, he’s the first out the door.

Alone.

I thought that he was just avoiding me, but maybe he was avoiding everyone.

“I’ll talk to him,” I say.

She smiles. “Sometimes people put up walls, not only to keep people out, but also to see who cares enough to tear them down. Understand?”

I nod and exit the stage. As I weave through the backstage darkness, I hear a scraping noise and head toward it.

“Holt?”

I find him in one of the dressing rooms, slumped in a chair with his head in his hands. The lights around the mirror glow behind him like a halo.

I step inside the doorway. He looks so miserable, I want to tell him it’s going to be okay, but I’m not sure what to say.

“Just let me quit,” he says without looking up. “You need someone else. Not me.”

“I don’t want someone else,” I say, moving toward him. “I just think if you trust yourself, and me, we could create something really amazing.”

“Taylor…” He pushes out of the chair and goes over to the windows. “I know my limit, and this is it.”

“Just try,” I say as I come up to stand behind him. “That’s all I’m asking. I know this stuff is hard for you, but don’t quit without at least trying.”

“Is there any use in trying, when I know how it’s going to turn out? I’ll choke and bring you down with me. You’re better off cutting your losses while there’s still time to rehearse someone else into the role.”

“It’s already too late for that,” I say, watching how his shoulder muscles strain against his T-shirt and wanting to soothe them. “I know the other day I said I didn’t want you to be my Romeo, but I was wrong. It’s supposed to be you. I can’t imagine anyone else doing it.”

He puts his hands on the windowsill, and his shoulders slump as he drops his head. “Why do you have to say shit like that?”

“Like what?”

“Stuff that makes me like you. It’s fucking annoying.”

I can’t stop myself any longer, so I place my hand between his shoulder blades and rub gently.

His muscles tense under my fingers, and when he inhales, it’s loud and ragged.

“Just get Connor to do it,” he says as he turns to face me. “He’d probably cream his shorts as soon as you kissed him, but he’d get the job done.”

“I don’t want to kiss Connor,” I say. “I want to kiss you.”

He freezes, and I think he’s stopped breathing.

He studies me for a moment before taking the smallest step forward. I keep my focus on him despite every instinct screaming at me to run. He could very well reject me again, but I’ve come this far. I can’t back down now.

“You really want me to kiss you?”

“Yes. Please, Ethan.”

“You don’t know what you’re asking.” His brows furrow.

“I do,” I say, and step forward. “If this is what you need to do to see if you can play this role, then let’s do it. It’s just a kiss.”

He steps back, panic building in his expression as I move forward.

“What if it’s not
just
a kiss?” he asks, as his back hits the wall. “What do we do then?”

I put my hands on his chest and feel how fast his heart is pounding. A noise vibrates in his throat, and I look up to see him staring at me. The need emanating from him makes my brain fuzzy and my legs weak.

“Stop being so dramatic,” I whisper, as I run my fingers up his neck and along his jaw. “If we kissed, we’d probably figure out that our bodies are as grossly incompatible as our personalities.”

God, I’m such a liar. I’m already turned on more than I’ve ever been in my entire life. Every part of me is screaming for him to touch me. He feels amazing under my hands.

“Taylor,” he says as he weaves his arm around my waist and pulls me closer. “The one thing we are definitely not is physically incompatible.”

He pulls me against him, and I gasp. I can feel him, long and hard on my stomach. Knowing I did that to him brings me feral satisfaction.

I press closer. He closes his eyes and groans. “This is a bad idea. Seriously.”

I weave a hand into his hair. “Kiss me.”

I touch my fingertips to his lips, and they open. His breath is warm against my hand. I run my finger across his top lip, then stroke the bottom one.

So silky. Soft.

He looks bewildered. “I’ve been nothing but an asshole to you since the first day we met.”

“I know.”

He rests his forehead against mine as his hands move across my back. “I’ve pushed you away, time and again. Yet you still want me to kiss you?”

“Yes. A lot.”

He grazes his hands over my ribs, and his voice is soft and breathless when he says, “Don’t you see how fucked up this is? How bad I’d be for you?”

“I know,” I say, unable to stop looking at his mouth, “but do you
want
it? Do you want … me?”

Just say it. Please.

He swallows again, and whispers, “Fuck, yes.”

I stand on my toes and tug his head down. When his mouth is close enough, I gently press my lips against his.

Oh. God.

We both inhale loudly, our bodies tensing as our connection explodes. My insides coil and tie themselves in knots, and he makes a grunting sound that’s a perfect blend of both pleasure and pain.

I release his lips and pull back. His mouth is open and soft, and I kiss him again, a little harder. I feel him exhale against my face, and I don’t know what the hell I’m doing, but I suck gently on his lips. Heat oozes under my skin. Fires in my belly. He makes another tortured noise, then he’s sucking on my lips, too. Every inch of me blazes. Heat from his mouth pulls into my lungs, and I curse myself for not having been kissing this man from the first day I met him, because what he’s doing to me is beyond incredible.

“I can’t believe no one’s ever done this to you before,” he says between increasingly desperate kisses. Then he pushes his tongue into my mouth, and all hell breaks loose. I’m lost in the sensual slide of him. Dizzying pheromones make me ravenous. There’s nothing in the room but him. No feeling in my body but what he’s giving me. No sensation in the world except his skin beneath my hands.

In that moment, I’m
that
girl. The one who’s confident, and beautiful, and desirable. I’m all of those things because of him. Because of what he’s bringing out in me.

I pull back to look at him, panting and overwhelmed. His eyes are wild, chest heaving. He looks how I feel. Raw and insatiable.

“Oh, God,” I say, because now I’m always going to want him like this. There’s no going back. “This is bad. Bad, bad, bad, bad.”

“I warned you,” he says, breathing heavily and cupping my face. “Why the hell didn’t you listen?”

Then he’s kissing me again, and everything I thought I knew about kissing is obliterated by his lips. His tongue. His small groaning noises. His hands and arms are everywhere and nowhere. I rake my fingers across his scalp while moaning into his mouth, trying to get enough of him and failing miserably.

“Oh, God.” I gasp as he moves to my neck, his mouth open and sucking. Driving me insane.

He walks me backward until my ass hits the bench in front of the mirrors. He hoists me onto it and pushes his hips between my legs. My skirt rides up as his swollen crotch presses against me.

We kiss, and grind, and tangle together, desperate for more. There’s too much fabric and not enough air. His hard is pressing against my soft, and I never knew anything in the world could feel so damn good.

“Jesus.” He groans, one hand grasping my hair as he uses the other one to find my breast. “This is just … Goddammit, Taylor. I’m so fucking stupid, because I knew you’d ruin me, and I let it happen anyway. I’m so screwed.”

“We both are.” I grab his head and make him kiss me more, because I’m addicted to the taste of his lips and tongue, but my hands need more, so they push under his T-shirt and find his stomach, flat and warm, trembling under my touch.

He grunts into my mouth and kisses me deeper. Then his hands are under my shirt and on top of my bra, caressing and fondling. Making the ache inside me so hungry, it’s painful.

He presses against me harder, but it’s not enough. I’m winding tighter and tighter, and nothing he’s doing is enough. I need more. All of him.

“Please.” I don’t even know what I’m asking for. For him to have sex with me? Here? Is that what I want?

“We shouldn’t.” He pants as he leaves my lips and kisses down past my ear, his breath hot and shallow on my skin. “This is fucking insane. Tell me to stop.”

“I can’t.”

He sucks hard where my shoulder and neck meet. I know he’s leaving a mark, but the pain doesn’t matter as much as him claiming me in that way.

He lifts me, then turns to press me against the wall, and when he grinds between my legs, I cry out with pleasure.

God, he’s so hard. I want him inside me, quieting the ache. Feeding the hunger.

“Jesus.” He rocks his hips faster as he cups my ass. “Cassie, if you don’t tell me to stop right now, I swear to God, I’m going to fuck you against this wall. You feel so good. I knew it. I knew you would.”