Chapter 4

“This isn’t a love story.
This is a slow, exquisite destruction.
And neither of them will survive it whole.”

Nathan’s POV

I never meant to write about her.

When I write about someone, I bury them in my bones. I let them crawl beneath the chaos, press their fingers to the rot, whisper their name into the walls of my mind until I can’t think straight.

I should’ve never written about her.

But now she’s in every line, between the stanzas, beneath my skin, and moaned into the silence of every night.

She is everything I should have left behind on that plane, a beautiful mistake, a flash of light in my endless dark.

Yet still, there she was. Right beside me. Like I hadn’t spent every night over the past months trying to forget the sounds she made every time she shattered beneath me. Like my hands didn’t remember the map of her body better than my own reflection.

We stood alone on the tennis court, surrounded by green so vibrant it felt obscene. The next field lay quiet across from us, empty, still, like even the world knew better than to interrupt whatever this was.

She hadn’t said a word since we arrived.

She was dressed like temptation, like a sin. A white tennis skirt clung to her hips, sinfully short, riding up just enough to make me forget how to breathe. Her matching sports bra left little to the imagination, hugging her chest so tightly it looked like it was molded there by some cruel god.

Her blonde hair was tied up in a high ponytail, strands falling loose around her flushed face like she had just walked out of a fever dream. A tennis white cap shadowed her eyes, but didn’t hide the glint that ruined me.

And the worst part? She had no idea. Didn’t see the way her skirt lifted as she stretched, or how my gaze followed every line like I was tracing poetry with my eyes. Didn’t know that she was seconds away from becoming the next thing I wrote about in blood and sweat.

She bounced the ball in one hand, absentminded, like she hadn’t just crawled out of my sheets two nights ago with bite marks down her spine. The other hand spun the racket around her wrist, slow and lazy. Her eyes stayed locked on the empty court ahead, brows slightly furrowed, as if strategizing some perfect shot.

So focused. So unaware. So fucking dangerous.

She didn’t know that I was two seconds away from dragging her off the court just to hear my name fall from her lips again, shaky, ruined, reverent. Like a curse or a prayer. Either worked for me.

I hated how unaware she was. And I hated how much I wanted to ruin that.

She turned to me, green eyes meeting mine, “We need to win this, okay?” she muttered.

I moved closer, hands shoved in the pockets of my shorts, my voice low. “Why?”

I knew why. But I wanted to hear her say it. I wanted to hear the lie she’d fabricate.

“Just because,” she replied, shrugging. “I don’t like losing.”

She placed the racket down, let the ball drop beside it. Then she stretched, arms above her head, back arched, skirt lifting. That tiny sports bra rode up just enough to make me forget my fucking name. Her damned skirt was so fucking short, it should’ve been illegal. White. Tight. Cut just to make me bleed, to make my blood roar loud.

She reached to the side to stretch again and I stepped in, closer now, close enough to smell her skin, the ghost of her shampoo, the fucking lavender perfume she wore.

“Why did you arrange this, anyway?” she asked. There it was—that note in her voice that I was waiting for. Frustration masked as curiosity. A flare of suspicion she couldn’t quite hide.

I shrugged. “Why not?”

Her eyes locked onto mine, trying to peel me open. She was always trying to figure me out like a puzzle that didn’t have corners. I could see the question in her gaze. What are we doing? But she didn’t ask for it. Not directly.

“It just feels like a double date,” she muttered, her voice soft but tight. “But you and me… we’re not even dating, so what’s the point?”

She dropped her arms, letting them fall to her sides like surrender. Her jaw tightened when I didn’t answer.

I just kept watching her, measuring her words, the way her voice dipped, the way her chest rose just slightly when she said we’re not even dating, like she was daring me to contradict her. Like I couldn’t see her pulse fluttering at the base of her throat.

That was the thing about her. She always said one thing, and her body said another. Louder. Needier.

I tilted my head, letting a slow, crooked smile pull at my mouth. Not out of joy. I don’t think I even remember what joy feels like. No, this smile was something else. Meaner. Sharper.

“Lilly and I played here a couple of times,” I said finally, dragging the words out, lazy and slow, like I had all the time in the world. “Last time we came, she said she’s bringing Chase next weekend, meaning today.”

I leaned in a little, my voice dropping. “So I figured I’d bring you. Keep things balanced, you know. Two against two. It’s more fun this way.”

Oh, it’s fun, alright. Watching her try not to snap. Watching her pretend this isn’t killing her.

I took a step closer. Aylin took a step back, right into the cold metal fence that surrounded the court. The rails dug into her back. I heard the soft whiff of breath leave her lips, felt the air change. Charged now. Tighter. Like a storm about to crack open the calm sky.

I let my eyes drop to her mouth. God, that mouth. She had no idea the kind of things I wanted to write into her skin with my tongue.

“You don’t mind, do you?” I asked, my voice all silk and smoke, like I wasn’t already mapping out how to break her next.

I kept my eyes on hers. I didn’t blink. Every flicker, every stutter of breath, I saw it. She could lie with her words, sure. But not with her eyes. And not with her body. Maybe she was easy to read, or maybe I was just really good at reading her.

But no, no, I take it back. She wasn’t easy to read. She was contradiction wrapped in skin, but I’ve made a craft out of deciphering chaos. Maybe she wasn’t giving anything away. Maybe I was just cursed with the kind of mind that sees everything.

She was a walking confession dressed as control.

No, I didn’t read her. I unraveled her.

She gave me a little shrug, chin lifted, like she wasn’t affected. “Of course I don’t.”

That was her first mistake.

“You don’t mind his presence, right?” I pushed, tone deceptively soft. “Him with her. Shouldn’t matter anymore. Shouldn’t bother you. Isn’t that what you said?”

“Yeah,” she nodded, voice clipped. “It’s been a long time. I moved on from that. From him.”

“From who?” I said, cocking my head like I didn’t already know. Like I didn’t wake up some nights hearing his fucking name echo in my skull because I knew it still echoed in hers.

Her brows drew together, eyes narrowing. “You know who.”

I clicked my tongue. Took another half-step. Close enough that I could feel the heat coming off her skin, like her anger was something alive under the surface.

“Say it,” I whispered. “Why don’t you ever say his name out loud? You should be able to say it, since it’s all so casual, and you are all moved on, right?”

Her jaw ticked. And oh, fuck, I loved that. That little flicker of fury, the crack in her mask. I lived for that moment. When her composure slipped and the chaos underneath peeked out, the one that looked so much like mine, I almost felt understood.

“I moved on from Chase, a very long time ago,” she snapped, voice hard. Clear. Spiteful. “Happy now, Nathan?”

My smile widened, slow, dangerous. “No,” I said simply. “Not even close.”

I moved on instinct. I did what I wanted to do. My hands clamped around her waist, spun her around like she weighed nothing, and pressed her chest against the cold metal fence. Her breath caught in her throat, sharp, and so fucking needy.

I shoved her skirt up, not that it took effort. It was already riding high like it was begging me to lose control.

“What are you doing?” she whispered.

But that wasn’t fear. That was breathless need masquerading as a question. She liked it when I lost control. She liked being the match that lit my chaos.

I leaned in close, my voice brushing her ear like smoke. “Teaching you what happens when you lie to me.”

I hooked my fingers around her panties and yanked them to the side, roughly, greedily, no patience left in me. My other hand went to the zipper of my shorts, tugging it down like I was seconds away from combusting.

My pulse was a war drum. My cock already pulsing with the kind of need that made men feral. Just like a madman, like an unhinged addict without his drugs, I slammed into her. Hard. Brutal. All at once. No warning, no grace, just claiming.

She choked out a sound, cried out, half gasp, half moan, and I swallowed it whole. Her body responded before she could stop it, arched back, clenched fists around the metallic rails, thighs trembling, like she was wired to take me. Like she was built for the violence I craved to pour into her.

“Nathan…” My name stumbled from her lips, breathless and ruined. God, it sounded like absolution and sin, like a hymn choking on lust.

I wanted to hear it again. Louder. Rawer. I wanted to hear it every fucking day till my last day.

I yanked the cap off her head and quickly threw it aside. Then, discarded the hair tie. Her hair spilled down like gold-lit chaos, a curtain of silk I wanted to fist, fuck, worship, and strangle her with.

My fingers tunneled through it, dove into the softness, curling hard. I pulled, yanking her head with enough force. She gasped, head snapping back, spine a perfect arch, and I dove into her neck like a man starved.

I bit. Her throat, her jaw, her lips. Marked her. Mouth to skin, teeth to pulse, bruises to memory.

“You’re going into a battle, princess,” I growled against her throat, every word dragging heat across her skin. “You don’t get to be coddled or babied right now.”

I gripped her hips harder, pulling her back with every savage thrust, the slap of skin-on-skin echoing through the court like applause from hell. Relentless. Punishing. Like I was rewriting every fuck that came before me, turning her into a book only I could read.

“You need to be provoked,” I snarled, my voice ragged, teeth sinking into her shoulder, “not protected.”

I buried myself deeper. Harder. My fingers were digging bruises into her skin like punctuation.

Her moans were my verses. My groans, the rhyme. And every brutal thrust between us, a line carved in lust and lunacy.

She tightened around me. Fucking hell. She tightened, like her body was trying to keep me, like it was begging me not to leave, like it knew I’d destroy her and wanted it anyway.

Her breath caught, sharp, breaking, and sinful. A moan spilled from her lips like a confession she couldn’t swallow. And then I felt it, her release crashing through her like a tidal wave of heat.

She trembled. Fucking shook.

Her thighs quivered against mine, her pussy clenching so tight I nearly blacked out. She gasped again, this time louder, richer, like her lungs didn’t know how to survive the aftermath of my ruination.

And it undid me. Like a trigger pulled deep in my spine. I groaned and came with a force that felt like violence. I poured myself into her, burying deep, deeper, until there was nothing left to give, until I emptied every last drop into her tight, wet heat like it was my only salvation.

I stayed there for a breath. Maybe two. Our bodies were locked. My chest heaving. My thoughts an incoherent static.

Then I pulled out, slowly, reluctantly, almost like I never wanted to be apart.

My cum dripped from her like ink running off a page. White and thick, sliding down her inner thigh, a trail of ownership, of victory, or maybe of ruin.

She turned around slowly, still catching her breath, still flushed and trembling. And when our eyes met, I almost lost it all over again.

Her face.

Fucking hell, her face.

Her cheeks were stained with color, eyes glassy, half-lidded and hazy, lips swollen and red from where I’d bitten them.

And the look, that look, wrecked, high, ruined…She looked like sin just whispered its name into her mouth. And she liked the sound of it.

I bent down, just a little, out of unhinged possession. My fingers trailed slowly down the inside of her thigh, gathering every drop I’d left behind, tracing the slick, messy folds of her pussy, slick from her, soaked in me.

She gasped again, twitching under my touch, too sensitive now. But I didn’t stop.

I dragged my fingers through the mess, slow and deliberate, until they were coated. Then I brought them to her mouth. I didn’t need to say it; she obeyed instantly. Her lips parted, and I slipped my fingers inside. She sucked. Licked. Tasted every drop like it was holy.

I watched. I watched her tongue swirl around my fingers, watched her eyes flutter as she swallowed me again.

“You look so fucking beautiful when you’re ruined,” I murmured, voice wrecked, low, “like you were born to be a dirty little prayer for my hands to recite.”

Her eyes opened fully, so green, wild, and wrecked. That dazed look of someone not just fucked, but undone. Bliss and destruction dancing in her gaze like twin devils. She liked it. That’s the part of her that drives me insane.

She likes it when I break her. She wants the fracture. She craves the burn.

I told her from the beginning, no commitment. No love. I don’t do soft. I don’t do safe. I don’t do forever. I never will.

I warned her not to fall. But she will. If she hasn’t already.

And when she does, I’ll catch her. Not to save her. But to drop her again. Just to hear what kind of sound she makes when she shatters differently.

My thumb grazed her lower lip, still swollen, still red, still marked by my teeth like it belonged to me.

“When you said his name,” I murmured, eyes locked on hers, “there was a look in yours that I can’t fucking stand.”

That flicker of pain. The wound that was furiously bleeding behind her lashes.

“It makes me want to break more than just your body.” I leaned in closer, mouth near her ear. “Next time I see that look in your eyes,” I whispered, deadly calm, “I’ll kill him.”

Her breath hitched. Eyes wide now, because she believed it. She heard the sincerity, the promise, and the violence tucked into every vowel.

“And I really don’t want to kill him,” I added, dragging my mouth along her jaw. “I like Lilly now. So, I’d rather not hurt her boyfriend.”

I pulled back just enough to look her dead in the eye, my voice dropping to a rasp. “So…you get me?”

She stared at me, lips parted, lashes still heavy with the afterglow of everything I’d just done to her.

And then…she smiled. Her lips pulled up, just a bit. Not sweet. Not soft. That slow, wicked smile that I loved and hated.

“You think killing him would fix that look in my eyes?” she murmured, her voice low, silky, sharp. “That you could fuck him out of me and bury the rest in blood?”

She stepped forward, so close our chests brushed. Her fingers slid up my shirt, not in affection, in challenge. She was dangerous. Fucking dangerous.

“I don’t want him, Nathan,” she said, eyes burning with fire, a fire I will burn her with. “But don’t flatter yourself thinking I’m yours either.”

Then she leaned in, so close her lips grazed mine into a very small, very soft peck.

“Your darkness doesn’t scare me,” she said, because that’s who she was. She’s not innocent. She’s not soft. She may pretend to be, but she likes the ruin. She’s addicted to the power I have over her, and more than that, to the power she thinks she has over me.

Her hand gently cupped my cheek, talking still, like she wanted to test how far I’d let her push. “You want to kill someone?” she asked, a smile curling cruelly at the corners. “Start with whoever made you this way.”

For a moment, I didn’t move. I didn’t blink. Her last words just sat there, festering, echoing. Start with whoever made you this way.

A silence opened between us. The kind before the knife hits the bone.

My jaw tensed beneath her palm. Then I reached up, slowly, and wrapped my fingers around her wrist. Not soft, but not too hard. Just enough to remind her who the monster in this story was.

“Don’t,” I said, voice low, dangerous, “Don’t ever speak of that again.”

I dropped her hand like it burned. I took a step back, as if I needed space to breathe.

“This, whatever this is, was never an invitation into the wreckage that built me.”

I looked her dead in the eye. “You’re here for a reason. You spread your legs, I empty the madness. That’s the deal. That’s all it’s ever been.”

My mouth curved into something cruel. A parody of a smile. “If that’s not enough for you, princess, then leave.”

I tilted my head, mocking. “I won’t go after you, I promise. I’ll find someone else to warm my bed before your perfume fades off my skin.”

I watched her carefully. The flicker in her eyes. I knew it would hit her, because I meant for it to.

But still…my voice dipped, rough and low, one last time. “You can crawl into my darkness, Aylin, but don’t you dare start digging through the bones.”

Before any of us could say a single word, the low whirr of wheels over pavement cut through it.

The cart. That stupid little white club cart. Its electric hum grew louder, rolling toward the court. Aylin flinched, just slightly. The sound yanked her out of her haze, and then she snapped into motion.

She tore herself away from me like I’d branded her skin, and she had seconds to erase the mark. She stumbled to her sports bag and dropped to her knees. Her fingers frantically rummaged, like maybe she could piece herself back together in under thirty seconds.

She tugged her hair into an elastic, twisting the messiness into something passable. Then she pulled out a small mirror and applied some lipstick. Quick fixes. Surface damage control.

I watched her thighs clench tighter as she reached under her skirt, adjusting herself,
trying to clean away the slick between her legs before it told the story we weren’t supposed to tell.

I didn’t move. I just watched her panic. Like I’d set the house on fire, and she was frantically fluffing the curtains before the guests arrived.

The cart stopped just as she zipped the bag closed and stood, flushed but composed.

Laughter spilled out from near, so soft, warm, too clean for the filth still clinging in the air around us.

Chase stepped off with that ever-calm smile of his, arm snug around Lilly’s waist like she belonged there. She did, actually. Right next to him, she was glowing. I secretly hated that, because it reminded me of Christian’s pain. I shook the thought away, trying to stay guarded in the moment.

They were mid-conversation, something about rackets or lunch, or the weather, or whatever normal couples talked about, when Lilly’s gaze drifted from him and fell on me, on us.

Her smile slowly fell, and she paused, her eyes widening, just a bit when they took notice of Aylin’s presence. Then her gaze cut to me. Her previous soft look twisted into a glare, her jaw tightening, her eyes sending me a low fuck-you.

I smiled sheepishly and shrugged, ever so innocently.

Lilly tried to shake it off. She forced a smile, tight, brittle at the edges, and turned to Aylin like nothing had happened, “Aylin,” she said, voice a little too high. “Didn’t know you’d be here.”

Aylin smiled back, just as tight and awkward,  “Neither did I,” she replied softly.

Her eyes flicked to Chase, she forced a small nod of acknowledgment before her eyes fell on Lilly again, “Anyway…it’s good to see you.”

Her voice didn’t tremble. She wasn’t breaking. Not yet.

Chase gave her a nod, unreadable as always, though I caught the brief glance he gave Lilly. A questioning, what-the-fuck-is-this look. Lilly shook her head cluelessly, her eyes briefly coming to me, and she mouthed: I will kill you.

My smile widened. I winked, then tossed her a flying kiss, just to piss her off. God, I love making messes everywhere I go.

I grabbed my racket, casual as hell, and stepped forward. My arm slid around Aylin’s waist, like I hadn’t just rearranged her body parts against the court fence.

“Look at us,” I said, breaking the silence with a grin. “Two couples, one tennis court, and enough unresolved tension to fund a drama series,” I chuckled, “If this were a soap opera, someone would get pregnant before the set change.”

Lilly’s glare cut straight through me. “Could you not?”

“What?” I tilted my head, mock-innocent. “I’m just appreciating the irony.”

Chase glared at me. He never liked me, but learnt to tolerate me slightly over the past months. Aylin stayed quiet. Smart girl.

“So…” I clapped my hands once. “We playing, or are we here to pretend we all like each other for another twenty minutes?”

Chase stepped forward, tossing a ball up and catching it again. “Let’s start, shall we?”

Lilly shrugged. “Fine, whatever.”

Aylin didn’t answer, her fingers tightening around her racket.

I watched her, still trying to decide if she was about to unravel or snap. Either way, this was going to be fun.

The match started off lightly. Fake laughs. Forced grins. That brittle, buzzing kind of tension you only get when people are pretending not to loathe each other’s company. I mean, Lilly and I click just fine. We’ve had fun here over the past weeks. But add Aylin and her ex-boyfriend into the mix, and suddenly this whole tennis court starts to feel like a well-decorated crime scene waiting for the first body to drop.

Chase served first. Clean. Efficient. Effortless, like everything else he fucking did. The kind of serve that said I’m only here because my girlfriend asked me to be. His stance was classic, left foot forward, elbow high, follow-through like he’d done it a thousand times. The ball left his racket with a tight pop, arcing like it was born for the baseline.

I scoffed. Show-off.

I returned it, a bit harder than necessary. A tight forehand, a bit low, sharp. He caught it like it was nothing. Returned it with the same damned grace, barely a sound. Still calm. Still perfectly collected.

We settled into a rhythm fast enough, muscle memory, and ego, making the rules. But this wasn’t a game. Not for me, at least.

For Chase, it was just…cardio, probably. A favor to Lilly. A little Sunday competition with no real stakes.

But for me? It felt like war, and the worst part was that I didn’t even know why. Or maybe I did.

The ball ricocheted back and forth. The rhythm was vicious. Sometimes fast, other times hard, slicing across the court like an insult. I gripped the racket tighter, knuckles whitening, movements sharper than they needed to be. Controlled violence, that’s what this had become.

It became obvious, very quickly, that Chase and I had unofficially decided something: The girls weren’t playing. Not really. Not today.

I mean, they tried.

Lilly called out, “I got this!” Just as Chase intercepted with a smooth cross-court backhand, almost like he didn’t hear her. Aylin raised her racket, knees bent, ready, and I cut her off with a diagonal drive that slammed the baseline just to make a point.

Again. And again. And again.

I caught every ball like it owed me blood. Swung like I was hoping the strings would snap and whip me in the face. My eyes locked on Chase like I was dissecting him, searching for cracks in a foundation that didn’t seem to shake. His footwork was light, effortless. Always in position. The bastard made it look boring.

“Anytime you boys want to let us in?” Lilly called from across the net, frustration bubbling beneath her voice.

Chase gave her a sheepish smile, like a kid who forgot to do the dishes. “Sorry, babe. Got caught up.” He jogged over, pressed a soft kiss to her lips, and whispered something that made her smile. I could’ve gagged.

I snorted. “Yeah, wouldn’t want the girls messing up the stats. You know how emotional they get under pressure.”

Lilly flipped me off without hesitation. Iconic, really.

Aylin? She didn’t even look at me. Just blew a loose strand of hair out of her face, calm and detached. “From where I am looking, you’re the only one emotional here, Nathan,” she muttered.

Touché.

Still, despite everything, despite the rules I made, the distance I claimed, the walls I built and swore I’d never let crack. I wanted to win this for her.

And I wasn’t about to let her ex-boyfriend win over me in front of her, especially not after I’d had her legs wrapped around my waist less than ten minutes ago.

I slammed the next ball across the net so hard it clipped the white tape and skidded dangerously low. He got to it. Of course he fucking did. Smooth little glide across the court, wrist loose, grip steady. He returned it with the same precision, and my jaw tightened with every step he took.

I was getting angry. This wasn’t good.

Score: 3-1.

Their fucking lead.

Lilly tossed it my way with a victory smile. I lunged for it, knees bent, arms loose until impact. I returned it, too hard. The ball hit the net, kissed it. Dropped. Chase didn’t get to it in time.

“Still emotional?” I muttered under my breath, smirking as the point landed in our favor.

“Still losing,” Chase replied, cool as hell.

Score: 3–2.

The next serve came. Chase took the lead. I swung and missed. Fuck.

Lilly cheered. “Four–two! We’re actually winning!”

She was already bouncing in place like she’d just unlocked some core life achievement. Chase jogged over, pressed a kiss to her cheek, “Told you I had you,” he said, and I wanted to break something.

She beamed. I stood there, racket in hand, pulse pounding like a war drum behind my ribs, fists clenched, knuckles aching from the grip.

I turned to Aylin. She hadn’t moved. Her racket dangled at her side like a forgotten accessory. Her expression? Cold. Not indifferent, just utterly furious. Furious that I hadn’t passed her the ball. Furious that I’d made this whole thing about me again.

He served again. Fast. Direct. Lilly volleyed it this time, surprise of the goddamn century, and I missed it.

Lilly shrieked with delight, flinging her arms around Chase, almost jumping on him, and had him staggering backward.

The racket flew from my hand before I could stop myself. It hit the pavement with a loud, jarring crack, the kind that made everyone look, but no one spoke.

I felt the heat of fury rush up my neck, my ears, my fists. Not here. I couldn’t lose it here. Not in front of them. So I turned. I didn’t say a word, I didn’t meet anyone’s eyes.

I stormed off the court, past the bleachers, past the neat rows of hedges. I slipped behind the storage building near the edge of the club, where the shadows were thicker and the air didn’t taste like politeness and sunscreen.

It was quiet there. Dead quiet. Just a gravel path, a bench warped by the sun, and a rusted water tank humming low.

I pulled the cigarette pack from my back pocket with unsteady hands. I fumbled one free and lit it, then dragged in that first inhale like it was oxygen laced with venom.

Smoke filled my lungs, burned, stung, and soothed. I held it in. Held it until the ache in my chest became sharper than the one in my head. Only then did I let it out. Slowly. Bitterly.

I leaned back against the wall. My eyes flicked to the sky, all blue and calm and mocking. My jaw clenched, and I took another drag, longer this time.

I let my eyelids drop, just for a second, to cage the chaos and to calm the screaming in my blood.

But then…something tore the cigarette from my fingers.

My eyes snapped open and met hers. Furious, wild, green eyes blazing like a storm had crawled inside her and started setting fire to everything in reach.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” she snapped.

Her fingers trembled slightly as she tossed the cigarette to the ground and crushed it under her shoe like it had personally offended her.

“Are you out of your mind?” she hissed. “You had a lung transplant, Nathan. Like what…Five months ago?”

Each word came like a slap to the face. “You know what that means?” she barked. “It means you don’t get to play Russian roulette with your second fucking chance. You don’t get to do this bullshit just because you’re mad you lost a game.”

I stayed leaning against the wall, eyes on her. She was shaking, but not from fear. From rage. From care, she didn’t want to admit she felt. From watching me unravel and hating that she cared.

She took a step closer, shoving her finger against my chest. “You don’t get to burn the world down every time something doesn’t go your way,” she said, voice low now. Dangerous. “You want to be angry? Fine. Be angry. But don’t be stupid. Don’t—”

Her voice caught for a fraction of a second. She blinked hard, like the words wanted to come out softer, but she refused to let them.

“You don’t get to die,” she finished. “Not like that.”

Her words hung between us, and I hated them. I hated her for saying them. I fucking hated how they crawled under my skin and found the parts of me I didn’t want anyone touching.

I didn’t speak. I didn’t move for a very long second.

Fuck it.

I snapped and grabbed her hard. My hands found her waist and yanked her into me like I needed her to shut up or save me or maybe both.

My mouth crashed into hers, without any hesitation, without build-up, just claiming what was mine. She gasped against me, but didn’t pull back. She wouldn’t dare. Because we were the same kind of broken, wired for chaos, starved for touch that felt like drowning.

I angled my head, deepened the kiss, and dragged my tongue along hers like I was tasting the words she didn’t say. My hand fisted in her hair, pulling, tilting her head back so I could devour her better.

She moaned into me, angry but also needy, and that sound? That fucking sound was gasoline to my madness.

I moved and turned her, pressed her back against the wall of the shed, our bodies colliding, hips grinding. Her leg hooked around my thigh without thinking. My hand slid beneath the hem of her skirt, fingers digging into the soft skin of her ass.

I kissed her like I was trying to erase the fight from her mouth. Like I could fuck the care out of her tongue. Like if I kissed her hard enough, she’d forget I was the kind of man who’d kill himself slowly just to feel in control.

When I finally pulled back, we were both breathless. Both wrecked.

“You keep yelling like that, princess,” I rasped, my voice shredded and low, “and I’m going to start thinking you care.”

She opened her mouth, but I didn’t let her speak.

I leaned in again, lips brushing her mouth. “And we can’t have that…can we?”

Her breath trembled against mine, half defiance, half surrender. And fuck me, I wanted to drown in it.

My forehead dropped to hers, just for a second. Just long enough to feel the war between us, how it pulsed through her skin, how it mirrored the storm behind my ribs.

She was chaos in silk and teeth. A lullaby I never learned to sing without screaming. A beautiful fucking trigger.

I should’ve walked away, should’ve never touched her, should’ve never let her in long enough to taste the parts of me I keep buried in metaphor.

She’s the poem I should’ve burned.

But I didn’t.

I wrote her anyway.

Line after line, breath after breath, I etched her into the kind of verses that leave paper torn and blood on the pen. Because that’s what she does to me. She turns need into violence. Desire into damage. Ink into bruises.

We weren’t in love, no, we were in ruins.

And still…I kissed her again, because I didn’t know how not to.

Because she wasn’t just in my poems. She was the goddamn poem.

And I? I was the writer who kept bleeding for the wrong ending.

⊹˚₊‧───────────────‧₊˚⊹

Aylin’s POV

The ride back was silent. Not the peaceful kind. The kind that buzzed under the skin like a bruise about to bloom.

Nathan didn’t look at me. I didn’t look at him. The basics of our relationship.

He drove like his pulse was a metronome and every second between us was counting down to detonation. We both knew what we’d just done. What we kept on doing, and what it would cost if we didn’t stop.

When we pulled up to my building, he finally spoke. “You want me to come up?”

It was casual. Like we hadn’t just been clawing at each other like animals. Like he wasn’t already halfway undressed in his mind.

I turned to him slowly. I gathered my courage, my control, and wavering strength.

“No,” I said, and my voice didn’t shake.

His brows lifted slightly, but he didn’t say anything. Just waited, his eyes unreadable.

So I took a deep breath and kept going. “You told me today that I could leave anytime,” I said. “That you wouldn’t go after me. That if I got bored or too emotional or too human, you’d find someone else to warm your bed.”

He didn’t move. He didn’t blink. But I saw his jaw tick. Just barely. He knew where this was heading.

I leaned closer, close enough for him to feel it, the ache still pulsing in my skin, the war still clawing at my ribs.

“Well,” I said softly, “I’m leaving.”

I watched something flicker in his eyes. Something dangerous. Something sharp. He should scare me. But somehow…he doesn’t.

That’s the problem.

“Don’t call, and never come to my place again,” I said, strictly.

“And no, I am not doing this because I’m bored. Not because I don’t want you,” I added, my voice low and steady now. “God knows you touch me and I forget how to breathe.”

I exhaled. “I like the ruin, Nathan. I do. I like how it feels when you pull me apart and make me forget my name.” His knuckles whitened on the wheel. “But I need to be smart now. I need to remember who I was before you turned me into your favorite form of destruction.”

I paused. “I deserve more than this, I think.” Did I, really? I didn’t. But I needed to try, at least.

I unbuckled my seatbelt. I reached for the handle, and in the space between my breath and movement, the thoughts I never said out loud bled into the silence.

This is toxic.
And I know it.
I’m not naive. I’m not soft. I’m not someone a man ruins gently. No good woman would accept this kind of half-love. This violence wrapped in hands that know how to make her moan just as easily as they know how to push her away.

I wasn’t a good person either. I knew that. I wasn’t clean, and I also wasn’t the kind of girl who gets protected.

I chased a man who never loved me. Let him haunt me. Let him carve himself into every word I said and never once say my name with meaning.

Chase ruined me, slowly, passively, by never choosing me.

And now Nathan…He’d ruin me, too. But not slowly. Not quietly.

He’d shove me over the edge with a kiss. And I’d thank him for the fall.

But I can’t do that again. I can’t let myself shatter for someone who only knows how to love through wreckage. Not this time. Not again.

Chase broke me by never holding me. Nathan would break me by never letting go.

And for once, just once, I needed to stop letting men decide how I end.

So I opened the door.

And I left.

He said before that it wasn’t love. That I was just a poem he couldn’t stop writing.

Well, Nathan…

This is the last stanza.

And then I shut the door.

And walked away from the only kind of destruction I’d ever begged for.