Bad Romeo (Starcrossed #1)(43)
Author: Leisa Rayven

He’s looking anywhere else but at me.

“It was fucking stupid and wrong … and … I used you.”

“No,” I say vehemently. “You didn’t. I wanted you to—”

“Taylor,” he says, “I humped you like a fucking dog. In front of our acting teacher. What the hell is wrong with me?”

“Holt—”

“Olivia is right. I need a psych eval. Whenever I get around you, I lose my head. It’s fucking crazy, not to mention completely wrong.”

“But, we can just—”

“No, we really can’t.”

“Stop cutting me off! I’m trying to—”

“I know what you’re trying to do, but this isn’t up for negotiation! What we’re doing stops now, before either one of us gets hurt!”

I want to hit him with a witty comeback, but nothing comes to mind. I consider just hitting him instead.

His expression softens as he steps toward me. “Look, the path we’re heading down isn’t going to end well for either of us. Trust me on this. I can already feel you want things from me that I can’t give you, and if you fall for me? Well, that’d be one of the stupidest fucking things you’d ever do. There’s a whole bunch of girls who’ll attest to that.”

A flash of anger runs up my spine. “God, egotistical much? Maybe I don’t want anything from you.”

“Then tell me I’m wrong,” he says and holds out his hands. “Tell me the look on your face when you saw me a moment ago wasn’t excitement with a touch of ‘please fuck me now.’ Tell me you don’t think about me. Dream about me.”

I don’t say anything, because I can’t deny it. But I don’t understand why having those feelings is such a bad thing. With the way he’s talking, it seems like us becoming closer is tantamount to a crime.

“You want me, too,” I say.

“I’m not denying that,” he says as he steps closer. “And that’s part of the problem. You’re enough of a distraction already. If we start giving in to temptation, then … Jesus, Taylor, that’s all there’s going to be for us. Forget about us concentrating on our acting. Your virginity? Gone. My sanity? Gone. Our time here would become a blur of fucking and hormones, and I don’t want to get into that with any girl, especially you.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

He leans forward, so close I can smell his cologne. “It means fucking won’t be enough for you. You’ll want emotions and hand holding and romantic bullshit. And you deserve all that stuff, but that’s not me. Not anymore.”

“Why not?”

He looks down and doesn’t answer.

“God, Holt, some girl really did a number on you, didn’t she? Was it that girl from yesterday?”

There’s silence, but he gives me a look that warns me to not push it.

“What did she do to you?”

“Nothing. What happened between us was my fault, and I’m not going to make the same mistake twice. I’m sure she told you to stay the fuck away from me. Take her advice.”

I feel like he’s breaking up with me, even though we’ve never actually been together.

All of a sudden, I’m really tired. I feel like I’m always fighting to be with him, while he’s fighting to push me away.

“Fine,” I say. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have feelings for you. You’re obviously not worth it.”

I hate that he looks hurt when he says, “Obviously.”

Feeling too drained to argue, I walk toward the theater door. Just before I pull it open, I turn back to him.

“Holt, there aren’t many people in the world who connect like we do, for whatever reason, and saying that we shouldn’t feel it isn’t going to make it go away. One day you might figure that out, but by then it’ll be too late.”

I turn my back on him and close the door behind me.

“Okay, Miss Taylor, let’s take it from ‘What’s here.’”

We’re rehearsing the death scene. Holt is lying in front of me, motionless. Romeo has poisoned himself.

Idiot.

As Juliet, I’m distraught, seeing the love of my life dead on the ground. Killed by his own hand because he couldn’t go on without me. He didn’t know I was just sleeping. You’d think he would have checked for a pulse, right?

I try to pull his body up and hug him, but he’s too heavy, so I’m resigned to lying across his chest. Too shocked to cry, too emotional to not. I run my hands over him as if the force of my need will bring him back to life. Save him from himself.

But there’s no saving to be done. His rash decision has killed us both, because without him in my world, I’m dead inside, even though I still have the illusion of life.

With the acceptance of death in my heart, I just need to find the means.

I run my hands down his arms and discover him clutching a small vial.

“What’s here?” I say, my voice hoarse with emotion. “A cup, closed in my true love’s hand?”

Holding it under my nose, I sniff, then groan in anguish. “Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end.”

I look inside, needing just a remnant, but it’s empty. Furious, I hurl it away.

I grab Romeo’s head and scold his still, beautiful face as the tears spill over.

“O churl! Drunk all, and left no friendly drop to help me after?”

His lips are parted, and I lean over and close my streaming eyes as our foreheads touch.

“I will kiss thy lips. Haply some poison yet doth hang on them … to make me die … with a restorative.”

I gently press my lips against his. Still so soft. How can he be dead and still feel so alive?

I suck at them gently, desperate to find any trace of the poison. Holt tenses beneath me.

“Thy lips are warm.” I sigh against his mouth.

He tenses even more.

I swipe my tongue along his bottom lip, and he grunts as his body twitches.

“Stop there!” Erika calls out.

Holt sits up and glares at me.

“Well, Juliet,” Erika says. “It seems your lips have miraculous healing properties. If only Shakespeare had written Romeo’s dramatic recovery in the way Mr. Holt has just improvised, there’d be a whole lot less tragedy at the end of this play and people could go home whistling a happy tune.”

“She licked my lips,” Holt protests.

“That’s totally what Juliet would do,” I say. “She’s trying to ingest his poison. You’re lucky I didn’t stick my tongue in your mouth and swirl it around like a toilet brush.”