Breathe for Me

chapter Fifteen





Chelsea walked faster and faster until she was running. But he kept pace with her every damn step of the way. Of course he did. Because she was still slow. She still had a leg that refused to recover to be as strong as it had once been. Because it had been that badly broken. The bloody thing was never going to be back to what it once was.

Nor was she.

“Chelsea—”

He’d followed her outside.

“I don’t want you to do this.” She kept her face away from him—even when he stood smack bang in front of her, less than an inch away.

“What do you want me to do then?” he demanded. “Why don’t you tell me what it is you want from me?”

Startled she looked up. Her pulse skidded when she saw the alertness in his eyes, the energy in his body. The aggression.

He was as angry as she.

“What is it you want from me?” he repeated, even angrier.

His emotion was a tinder strike to hers. Fury rose. A tsunami built of muddy, confused emotions—frustration, fear, guilt. She didn’t want him to try to fix her. She wanted him to f*ck her. And that was all. Right?

“You want to get back in the water,” he challenged. “I’ve seen the way you look at it. You want back in Chelsea. You do.”

“That’s something I need to do myself.” She didn’t want to deal with anyone else over this. Certainly not with him.

“Because you won’t let anyone help you?” He shook his head. “It’s bullshit.”

“I don’t need someone to help me,” she flung back at him. “I don’t need someone to rescue me.”

If anything he looked angrier. “But you need someone to get you off?” He stepped forward. “I don’t want to be that guy anymore.”

“Really.” She crossed her arms and glared at his groin. The guy’s erection from the kisses before was only just subsiding.

“I’m not that out of control,” he growled.

“No,” she murmured. “You never are.”

“What does that mean?”

She just held his gaze, glaring at him.

“Isn’t that how you like it?” The skin around his mouth whitened. “Isn’t that what you wanted from me? To take the lead?” He shook his head in frustration. “This isn’t about me, Chelsea.” He spoke quiet, quick. Lethal. “This is about you.”

That was the last thing she wanted. “I don’t want you to—”

“You don’t want to talk, you don’t want to swim,” he interrupted in a furious tumble of words. “Well save yourself the struggle, because I already know why. It’s the accident. It’s about the night your fiancé drove off the road and you both ended up in a river.”

Chelsea reeled back like she’d been punched in the nose. Her eyes watered, pain howled through her head. He knew? How did he know? Horrified, she clapped her hand over her mouth. She stared as disbelief raged through her system.

“When did you find out?” She breathed harshly. How the hell had he found out? Who had he talked to?

He hesitated. “A day or so after the fire alarm.” His expression blanked, his answer came calm and even. But his eyes never left hers.

She leaned against the wall, dropping her gaze to the ground. All this time he’d known? Since almost the moment they’d met? Before they’d even had sex? He’d known basically the whole time? And what had he made of that? Was this whole thing part of his wretched lifesaver syndrome? Had this been nothing but sympathy sex?

No wonder he’d waited those little moments for her to fill in an extra detail—and she never had. She’d not wanted to. She still didn’t want to.

“You should have said something,” she said. “You should have told me that you knew.”

It hurt. Betrayal, pain shafted through her chest.

“I was waiting for you to be ready to tell me.”

Her mouth dropped and she stared at him. She wasn’t ever going to be ready to tell anyone the whole truth. She’d never be able to. She couldn’t. “That’s not…” she broke off. “That wasn’t what this is about.”

“What was I supposed to do?” He turned away, running a hand through his hair and then whirling back to face her. Defensive. “You were walking around with a giant diamond on your engagement finger but giving me those eyes and you—” he drew in a sharp breath. “You wouldn’t tell me.”

“That was my right. I don’t tell anyone here.” She’d never told another person the whole truth of that night. “I wanted to forget it for a while. Wasn’t that the whole point of this thing between us. Isn’t it all about the fantasy?”

“Yes.” His face had paled. “But it’s still based on trust, Chelsea. There’s honesty at its core. There has to be. You could have trusted me.”

“I did trust you Xander.” She shook her head. “Do you think I’d ever have put myself in such a vulnerable position with you if I didn’t?”

His expression shuttered. “But only physically.”

She couldn’t trust anyone with anything more. “That’s all this was meant to be.”

And now she felt betrayed. He’d changed the protocol—the status of this arrangement.

“So you didn’t try to find out anything about me?” he asked. “You didn’t ask Brad about me?”

He knew that? Oh that was embarrassing.

“And you didn’t ask Logan?” he added.

And she thought she’d been subtle. “That’s different.”

“How?”

“They were never going to tell me something so…”

“So…?” he prompted.

So personal. So private. Something that if he knew…

“Okay,” she said crisply. “So you know. Tom died and I lived and I’m single and staying that way.”

He shook his head. “You’re just not over it yet. You’re never going to stay single. You’re not built to be alone.”

“Don’t patronize me. I’m stronger than you can ever imagine.” But even though it was the truth, her stupid eyes filled with tears again.

“I know strength.” He stepped forward, framing her face in his hands. “I know how strong women can be. But you don’t have to be alone all your life. That’s not right for you. You’ll fall in love again one day.” He pressed his lips together firmly.

That ridiculous prophecy made her all the more determined not to.

He suddenly laughed. “Sometimes you’re so obstinate.”

“Don’t belittle me.”

“Chelsea.” He sighed and took a step back. “I’m sorry I tried to get you to do something you weren’t ready for. I was trying to help.”

“I don’t want you to help in that way. I just want—”

“Me to f*ck you.”

Her heart clenched. She couldn’t let this become more than that. And he didn’t really want anything more, did he? She couldn’t bear to be hurt again. “I just want to have fun with you. And yes, having sex with you is a big part of that.” She closed her eyes. “I just wanted to have a good time. And for you to have a good time.”

That mattered more than it probably should.

His hands settled on her shoulders. “I do have a good time with you, Chelsea.”

“Then we’re okay.” She willed him to understand. “Xander, this is what is. Don’t try to change it,” she pleaded. “Don’t try to help me. Yes, I’m scared of going in the water again. I can’t ever tell you what that night was like. What happened. Please don’t ask me to. Please don’t try to help me with that.” She looked down. “If you can’t leave it, then we need to end this.”

There was a long moment of silence as she waited for his answer.

“We’re not ending it yet,” he said in a low voice.

Relief swept through her in such a force her legs went weak. But he still looked serious, his jaw firm. Shadows lurked in the depths of his eyes too.

Everyone bore some kind of scarring—it was part of life. Of course now she wondered what troubles his life had dealt. Even though she’d just said physical was all this was, her curiosity about him rose.

As they were driven back into the city, she twisted in the back seat to face him. “You know, it’s not fair you know something of my past and I know nothing of yours.”

He shrugged, keeping his focus on the window. “Not my fault if my research was better than yours.”

“But maybe we need to even things up. You could tell me something.”

“I could.” He answered light enough.

But he wasn’t going to. Which, she supposed was fair given she’d been the one to ask him not to try to help her, to ask her to talk. But his attitude sparked her own. “I could force it out of you.”

He turned his head, his eyes kindling. “How would you try to do that?”

Her brain fuzzed at his changing expression—the predatory sharpening of his features. Lust. Excitement thrummed in her veins. That’s what she wanted—for him to be aroused. For him to lose all control in his desire for her. Maybe that’s what she needed to make him do.

Xander didn’t go back to his apartment after the aquarium fiasco. He didn’t want to give her time to retreat back into her shell. He’d agreed not to ask, but that didn’t mean he was going to back off completely.

Maybe he was a damn fool, but he just couldn’t. He followed her into her apartment, took a seat in the centre of her sofa and pulled out his phone to check for emails—his basic displacement activity. But to his utter shock, given the tense conversation they’d just had, she didn’t try to distance herself from him. Instead of retreating, she sashayed towards him. It seemed the last thing she felt at the moment was anger.

“What would you like to do with me? To me?” she asked.

“You’re offering yourself up for anything?” Xander asked, somewhat bemused. Didn’t she get that she did that to him on a nightly basis already? He spun the story and she danced.

She nodded, her gaze fixed on his.

Her wide-eyed supplication rubbed off the thin scab that had barely grown over the unresolved frustration.

“What do you want to do?” He watched her eyes as he asked her straight out. “Tell me what you want to do. You know you can tell me anything.”

Shadows appeared. Uncertainty. Reluctance. She wasn’t going to—either say or do. Why the hell not? As much as he still wanted her, it pissed him off.

He could be as dominant as any other red-blooded guy when he had to, but he wanted a partner, not a slave. At least, he could do the master/slave thing for fun sometimes, but sometimes he wanted to be the slave. Well, for about two minutes before he broke the chains and staged a coup. But still, he’d make an effort to submit for a few minutes. Trouble was, he wanted her to make the effort. But she wouldn’t. Nor would she talk to him. She didn’t want anything more than what he came up with, she’d just made that more than clear.

He stood up from the sofa and pocketed his phone.

“This isn’t going to work Chelsea. I’m sorry I pried into your life, I shouldn’t have,” he said walking towards her door and avoiding looking at her eyes. He didn’t want to see her hurt at all. “I can’t be the guy you need.”

It wasn’t enough for him anymore.