Page 61 of Raspados & Regret

That word again, and my patience snaps its teeth together.

“Maybe,” I repeat.

His smile grows. “You got a problem with maybe?”

“I got a problem with you running your mouth and then hiding behind it.”

His eyebrows lift. “Hiding?”

“Yeah.”

He steps closer so there’s barely a foot between us and has to tip his head back a little to look at me, which should make me feel bigger. Steadier and in control.

It doesn’t, because Elías looks up at me like he already knows where my hands are going to end up.

“You think I’m hiding?” he asks.

“I think you fucking talk too much for your own good.”

“That’s not anything new.” He smirks. “Ma says I came out of the womb a chatterbox.”

I keep going. “I think you like pushing me.”

“I think you like being pushed.”

My chest rises against the crop top, and his eyes drop to the movement. He doesn’t even pretend. I grab his wrist, not hard enough to hurt him. But hard enough to stop the slow drag of his attention from making me lose my mind.

His pulse jumps under my fingers.

It’s not just me.

He looks at my hand around his wrist, then at me.

“You always grab men who annoy you?” he asks.

“Only one who’s asking for it.”

His mouth opens, and I know he has a comeback. I see it sitting on his tongue, so I wait. Then he swallows it.

Good.

Fucking great—now I’m going to die.

His voice drops. “You gonna do something, or is this some machismo bullshit?”

The words hit exactly where he aimed them.

Machismo bullshit.

That’s what this is, two grown men standing behind trailers, chests up, jaws tight, acting like the first one to move loses. Like wanting the other makes one of us weaker. I move before I can talk myself out of it, shoving him back against the side of the trailer.

The metal rattles behind him, and Elías sucks in a breath, eyes going wide for one perfect second before the smile comes back. “There he is,” he says.

I flatten my palm on the trailer beside his head. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Act like you didn’t want this to happen.”