Page 111 of Savage Ambition

“Say one more word about him,” I threatened. “Give me a reason to knock you into next week.”

“You’re sick,” he choked out.

“And you’re a liar,” I replied, squeezing hard enough to remind him how easily I could silence him. “You’re so hard you’re practically throbbing while I choke you. Is this what you want, Jace? Is this what you’ve always wanted?”

His face contorted with shame as I rocked against him again, forcing an unwilling moan from his throat that he couldn’t suppress.

“Feels good, doesn’t it?” I taunted.

Jace clawed at my wrist, his face turning red.

“All your rage is disguising the fact that you like dick as much as us.” I eased up enough to let him gasp. “You’re pathetic for hating us for being honest about what we want while you lie to yourself every single day.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jace denied.

“You’re never going to have him or me,” I murmured in his ear. “He’s mine. You don’t get to talk about him or even think about him.”

Trent pulled at my shoulder. “Shaw, ease up before you kill him for real.”

I shoved off Jace and stood.

Jace rolled onto his side, coughing violently as he gasped for breath. Blood from his split lip stained the marble. The sight of what I’d done should have horrified me, but all I felt was a cold, hollow satisfaction.

“I don’t need your protection, and I sure as hell don’t need you as a friend!” I snapped.

“You would choose that asshole over our friendship?” Jace asked through a cough.

“If you were really my friend, you wouldn’t make me choose.” I stared down at him with contempt. “That’s not protection. It’s pure jealousy.”

“What? You’re just going to walk away?” Jace pushed himself upright, bracing against the wall as he swayed. “After everything we’ve been through?”

I turned on him. “You mean like the time you said that gay guys who hit on straight men deserve to get their asses kicked?” My voice cracked with emotion. “Did you think I didn’t hear you? That I didn’t feel every single word like a knife in my gut?”

“It wasn’t aimed at you.”

“Bullshit! You’ve spent years making it perfectly clear how you view people like me. I hid who I was because you made the consequences crystal clear.”

Jace tried to step toward me, but I backed away.

“Do you have any idea what it’s been like to live in fear that my best friend would hate me if he knew the truth?” I demanded. “How much it hurt listening to you talk about gay men like we’re perverted predators? After my parents died, you and Trent were all I had left, so I put up with your casual cruelty.”

His face paled. “I never meant to hurt you.”

“I stayed silent because I couldn’t bear to lose you. Now, I’ve lost you anyway.”

“You haven’t lost me,” Jace protested. “I’m being a good friend by protecting you.”

My laughter sounded on the verge of hysteria. “Is that what you think you’re doing? You tried to ruin the first real thing I’ve had since I moved here.”

Jace winced. “Damn it, Shaw, if I had known you were queer, I never would have said those things.”

“That shouldn’t matter. You’re trying to salvage your ego because you got caught being an asshole. You haven’t apologized once for the years of homophobic bullshit, for attacking Dante, for making me feel like I had to hide who I am to keep your friendship.”

When Jace tried to apologize, I cut him off. “Get the fuck out. If you ever go near Dante again, I’ll do a lot worse than bloody your face.” I turned my back and walked away.

“Do you think he actually cares about you?” Jace called after me. “You aren’t special to him when he sees you as nothing but another dick he has to suck to make rent.”

I turned back to lunge for him again, but Trent caught me around the waist. “He’s not worth it,” my cousin muttered. “Don’t give him what he wants. Let me deal with him.”