Page 18 of Lost & Found
She never used to be able to raise just one eyebrow. I tried to help her figure out how but she always ended up making weird faces with a combination of wide and squinty eyes instead.
“You’re dating Liam, Hollis,” I mention in a very defeated and disappointing tone. “In case you’d forgotten, that fucker bullied you for years. Bulliedus. And I didn’t just get verbal abuse. I took bruises from that asshole. You’d really stoop so low as to befriend him after everything he’s done to us, let alone be his girlfriend?” Saying those last words out loud felt like a hammer to the ribcage. It feels like being stabbed by someone you trusted, actually that’s almost exactly what this is.
Anger bubbles in me even more than I thought possible when I think about them being intimate with each other. Have they had sex? The thought of anyone touching Hollis that way sends me down a Wonderland spiral but to think of Liam’s hands on Hollis…I can feel the boil in my blood.
“Wow.” She claps sarcastically. Once. Twice. Three times. “Great job, Jaxon. You know you’ve really set the bar so fucking high now. Real proud of you.” She's now talking in a low-pitched and insincere tone and the way she looks at me like I’m so far below her sends my emotions into a free fall of vexation.
“Don’t be a bitch, Hollis.” I almost regret it as soon as it comes out, but if she wants to be a stubborn hard-ass, she's going to take it the way she gives.
“Name calling, fantastic. Guess you’re not so different from Liam after all.” She moves to get past me again, but this time I force her in place, grabbing her by her wrist and pulling her toward me.
“Take that shit back," I growl savagely. This action of mine knocks me off my ass in surprise butsheis doing this to me. I’m heated, and angry. And maybe every ounce jealous but at the end of the day, she’s not going to run me over like road kill and back the car up a couple hundred times.
She doesn’t get to tell me that she’s mad at me and then not tell me what I did wrong while making me feel so fucking small in the process. If she thinks she’s the only one who’s changed…she’s wrong.
“Get the fuck off me!” She yanks her arm free from my grip and I let her back away.
“You know that’s not fucking true.” I push my hand through my hair again, not realizing that I let my anger get the best of me.
“Liam is agentleman. And why would you care? You had your chance.” She all but spits as the words bite me clean in the heart.
“Wait, what the fuck does that mean?” I mentally claw for the clarification.Had my chance? When?
She looks to the ground, seemingly trying to figure out her own words, running them over in her head. She regrets them. But why? We used to trust each other with everything. Where the fuck didmy Holligo?
I act on instinct, needing her to tell me how she really feels. So I rush in on her and pin her against the brick; my palms splay out on either side of her head. Our breaths match each other. Rough. Forced. Constrictive.
She doesn't react much otherwise; she just accepts her fate as she leans against the wall and looks up at me behind her dark, long lashes and her pool of tempest-colored eyes—careful not to meet me directly in eye contact, so instead her eyes land on my mouth.
“Tell me something," I whisper to her. Her chest rising and falling with every calculated breath.
She doesn't respond so I continue.
“Does he take care of you?”
“What?” She writhes in irritation below me, and I pull myself a tad closer to stop her from overthinking the question.
I trace her bottom lip with my thumb and the hum of her breathing tingles against my skin. Her eyes are now closed as she accepts the contact.
“Does he take care of you?” I ask again and this time she reacts.
“You can’t touch me like that!" She pushes me hard in the chest, causing me to stumble back a bit.
“Does he make you feel anything? Just tell me, Hollis." I try to keep her attention, but both of us are so upset, enraged, and fevered from our frustration that all we can manage is a verbal argument. But I need to know why she thinks she deserves someone like Liam. He has to be doing something to convince her that he's good enough for her.
She turns away from me, her arms held tight against her chest. I try to calm myself and approach her from behind. She doesn't move away from me, allowing me to lean into the back of her ear and ask her my next question in an intimate whisper—being careful to make sure I'm not touching her anywhere.
"Does he tell you you’re beautiful when you feel you least deserve it?"
She gasps.
"Does he give you butterflies the way you deserve them?"
She doesn't answer.
I reach out to attempt to pull her hair back from the front of her shoulder, she shifts slightly but doesn't pull away.
"Does he know where all your sensitive spots are, Hollis?”