Chapter Four

"Let me out of here!" Elijah thrashed and punched the walls, kicked out with his feet, making a bunch of noise, and screamed so loud, his voice grew hoarse.

He'd been letting out all his rage and frustration, all his fear and concerns, for the past however minutes since Violet had quickly and silently slid off him. He tried his best to not hit her in his ministrations because while he hated her with every bit of his being, he wasn't a complete asshole who'd ever take his anger out on a woman.

"Let me out! Let me out! Get me the fuck out of here!" The last was a bellow that he felt tore out of his soul. His body bowed upward with the force he let loose.

Spent, tired, and sore, he lay his head and shoulders back down and tried to catch his breath. His chest ached with tightness.

Violet Levine. That was a name he hadn't heard, a face he hadn't seen in years. Not since she walked out of their graduation before the ceremony had even finished. He remembered watching her continue walking, unzipping her gown and letting it fall to the shiny green turf under the late afternoon sun. Next came her cap, which she tossed away with a flourish.

She'd been wearing a white dress he'd never seen before, and he'd been one to pay attention to what she'd put on her body. This dress fit her as if made for her curves, coming down to rest just below her knees. She walked with a confidence he wished he had, head held up and gaze straight ahead.

Long chestnut tendrils came down her back in a rivulet of curls that had his hand clenching. Stunned speechless, he'd watched until she disappeared. He hated the attraction he'd felt toward her in that moment, the urge to follow her out and discover who this new girl was. Hated how much he missed their childhood friendship when everything had been easy. Before her existence in his life had ruined his.

But the ceremony had continued without a hitch, and later he learned she had left town altogether. He'd felt jealous of her escape, annoyed that he wouldn't be able to take his anger out on her anymore. Not in a physical sense. Never would he ever dare.

And sure, what he'd done to Violet in high school could make him an asshole, a jerk of the worst kind. But she'd started it first. Her family had fucked with his and won. It was only fair that she'd pay the price.

He froze, his mind spinning as thoughts bombarded. "Wait," he rasped out, throat sore. "Did you help put us here?"

She scoffed, the sound natural. "You have to be kidding right now."

"Answer me."

"Fuck off, Elijah. No, I didn't help put us in here. I didn't even realize you were in Georgia."

"I've been in Georgia for three years. Go to school at the University of Georgia."

Her laugh was disbelieving. "You're telling me I ran away to escape from you only to end up living in the same town some miles away?"

When she put it like that, it really was amazing.

He swallowed hard, not liking the sound of her running away because of him. Of course, his behavior had been awful toward her. "You leaving town like that was the topic of conversation for weeks."

"Bet you just loved that." Same sarcastic voice he'd heard before, only now she sounded very grown up. She'd felt much the same only minutes earlier.

He pursed his lips, blew out a quick breath. "To be honest, I was jealous as hell."

Another scoff. "Pray tell, what in God's whole glory would you have to be jealous about with me?"

He drew his brows down as he thought about how to word this. How to explain it to this woman whose family destroyed his childhood. He shifted, feeling something dig into his back. Reaching down to the offender, he pulled out what felt like a lighter.

"Oh, shit," he said.

"What?"

"I just found a lighter, I think."

"You think?"

"Well, sweetheart," he started sarcastically, "not like there's a whole lot of light in here to be sure. Only one way to tell, though."

He went to flick it on, feeling his way around for the rind, but then a hand landed on his chest and felt around until she got to his hand, then covered the lighter.

"Wait, who's to say this wasn't in here to have us find, then when we light it, the whole box explodes?"

He let out a surprised burst of laughter. "What?"

"You've heard the speaker several times now. What if when you light it, we blow up into smithereens?"

"Smithereens?" he repeated with a chuckle.

"Elijah, please."

He hated the way she said his name. Hated how his gut tumbled at the sound. Hated the feeling of her breasts pressed against his arm. Hated how he wanted to kiss her again.

He hated everything about her.

Closing his eyes as if that would give him time to escape her even though he couldn't see anything, he let out another breath and tried to regain some control over himself.

There was pressure in his sternum. A scream of frustration and rage that just begged to be set free.

"I need you to back off, Violet." Her name came out of his mouth with a foul taste.

"Where the fuck do you expect me to go? In case you missed it, we're stuck in a box."

Despite her words, he felt her move against him as if she tried to wiggle away. It only drew his attention to how her nipples had pebbled against his arm. And no matter how much he hated her, no matter how she ruined his life, his memories of a childhood, at the feel of those tight peaks, his mouth watered for a taste.

He rolled and snapped out a hand, finding purchase around what had to be her throat. She froze, and he leaned in.

"I can feel how much that kiss affected you, sweetheart."

She swallowed hard against his palm.

"If I touched you between your legs, would you be as wet as I suspect you are?"

A dainty hand wrapped around his wrist holding her. Shocking the hell out of him, she said, "Probably just as much as you are hard."

He released her quickly, pushing back but not getting very far. There was no way he'd confirm her comment, but he was disgusted with himself because it was true. He was as hard as a rock, ready to press inside her willing body. With every breath, he continued to take her scent into his lungs as if it was the best thing he'd ever smelled, and with every swallow, he continued to taste her sweet mouth. She'd moved over his lips with an unhurried skill he didn't know he craved but wanted more of.

Disgustingly so.

A low laugh sounded.

"What?" he asked.

"You really need to relax. It's basic biology. Nothing to hate yourself over."

"I don't hate myself."

"Maybe not, but you're really bothered by this attraction you feel toward me right now, aren't you?"

"Just like that time in high school, when you trapped me in the hallway and leaned close."

"What?" he asked, but he knew. He remembered that day too. He'd talked to her, cornered her in the stairwell. But he'd gotten too close. And his body had reacted instantly.

"You were hard against my stomach, Elijah. Don't think I didn't feel it. Don't think I didn't see how you wanted to kiss me even then."

"I can't fucking stand you, what do you think?"

A moment or two of silence ticked by, then, "Why?"

She truly sounded as if she were asking the reason, and it baffled him. After everything that had happened, she legit couldn't be this serious.

He stared through the darkness and pictured her face before him, seeing her as he did when she was in high school. High cheekbones, wide-set dark eyes, freckles splattered across her nose and cheeks, fuller top lip than bottom designed to drive him wild. He'd struggled with everything she'd done to his family and with the way his body reacted anytime he'd been near her. Almost to a point where he'd fed his hate with the lust coursing through him.

"Do we need to reminisce about what your mother and my father did?"

She sighed, and her breath coasted over his face. "You and I both know no one controls Lucile."

"That may be true, but then you tried to move in, too."

What could only be referred to as shock slammed through the air for several seconds, then she laughed, her hand landing on his stomach with the movement. Her head rested against his chest and in his mind, he pictured her doubled over. She smelled of strawberries and cookies, a compelling combination that made him want to taste her again.

Fuck.

He waited, part annoyed with her, part annoyed with himself, as she quelled her laughter.

"I did no such thing, Elijah. One, your father is old enough to be my father, and two, ewe."

He narrowed his eyes as if he could see anything. Having this conversation without being able to read her drove him half-crazy. "Then what the fuck were you doing at my house that day? You can't deny you weren't meeting with my father by yourself, in his office, and I might add, in his office by yourself. You two looked mighty cozy when you walked out."

She scoffed. "A man can't be alone with a young teenage girl … is that what you're implying?"

Had that been how he made it sound? If so, it wasn't what he meant. "He was touching your waist," he gritted out, the memory clear in his head as if it had happened yesterday. He'd demanded his father tell him what was going on after she left but his dad had remained mute on the topic, almost disappointed in him, as if he'd been the one caught alone with the daughter of the woman who'd ruined their family.

He'd hated the jealousy that had roared through him at the thought that his dad had done more than touch the young girl who was in his dreams every night.

"Do you really want to know?" she asked. "Is it that important? Or are you just looking for another excuse to hate me?"

"I want the truth."

"You've never wanted the truth. You made me into this villain in high school. Only to become your own kind of monster, Elijah."

He ground his teeth together, feeling a pain in the back of his molars. "Just fucking tell me."

Her hand clenched on his stomach, grabbing at the material of his tee. Did she realize she still touched him? The bigger question was, why didn't he move it away? He shook his head to refocus on Violet's explanation.

"Your dad was offering me money…"

"Of course he was," he said, disgusted.

"Your dad was offering me money," she said again, this time louder to talk over him, "to go away to college. To start a new life away from a town where his son had made my life complete hell."

He scrambled his way through shock and thoughts of betrayal, disbelief. His father had known what was occurring with Violet? Being the mayor of the town, he supposed his dad had a hand in quite a bit, but he'd never said anything to him. Never called him out on what he now knew was a really shitty thing to do day in and out. Holding her mom's actions against Violet was unfair.

Thinking back on his behavior back then didn't make him proud at all, but he was surprised his dad had said nothing. Could guilt be a reason for that? The guilt of cheating on his mom and breaking their family up?

"I turned it down, by the way. The money for college."

"Why?" he asked. If it were him in her situation, he would have taken it. She had come from little, lived in a house smaller than what they used to store their lawn equipment. "I figured with the things your mom did at her jobs…"

"Of course," she said, and her words sounded heated, angry. "Just because her mom is like that, working her way through men to find the next sugar daddy, the daughter must be the same, right?"

"I'm sorry. It was an asshole thing to say."

"I am nothing, nothing like her." She'd leaned in close and as fucked up as it made him, he wished he could see her face right now, see the fire spitting from her eyes, the splash of color from anger on her cheeks.

"I turned him down because I know everyone in that town would have expected me to do the exact opposite and would have held it against me forever. I wanted to prove to all of them I could support myself and didn't need a man to do it for me. That I was stronger, different from Lucile. And I've done it. Despite every hiccup, every shitty hand I've been dealt, I've done it for myself. With no one else there to help."

Her words echoed around his head, beating into him as if each were tiny fists pounding against his chest. He felt like the asshole he was for treating her the way he had. Someone who'd disappointed his father, who had most likely disappointed his mother, too. Someone who he'd disappointed himself.

He sighed, then wrapped a palm over hers on his stomach. She'd been moving the tee in her fist, but now froze. She tried to take her hand back, but he held her to him. "I'm sorry," he said. "It may not mean much now, but I really am sorry for how I treated you back then. There's not much more I can say now to make it up to you, but I will try to find a way to do so."

"I don't want anything from you, Elijah," she said, almost as if she were trying to gentle her words. "I just want to live my life on my own two feet."

"I know."

Several silent minutes ticked by. He rubbed his thumb along the back of her hand, still holding it to him. Giving her comfort? Or himself? He didn't know.

"What are the chances we're stuck in this box together?"

He winced at her question. "I don't think it's much."

"What does that mean?"

"I think I know the reason we're in here."