I hate that the photo is in a room with dozens of empty memories. A few frames over, we’re holding hands underneath the Eiffel Tower during a family trip to France. Fake. Another, he kisses me in a gazebo. Fake. I sit on his lap during a boating trip in Greece. Faker. Why do we have to tarnish the real memories in our friendship by placing them with phony ones from our pretend relationship?
“Please,” I beg.
“Where am I going to get better proof that we’re a couple?” he protests, inching towards me just to make this even more awkward. My back hits his desk, and I hope to God we’re not reenacting the earlier kitchen scene. But then I kinda do.
“Technically…” I say, eyes on his chest. “…this is my room too.”
“Yeah?” He sets the photo back on the shelf above me, and before I can turn and snatch it, he clasps my wrists in a tight hold. He stretches my arms behind my back. Oh my God.
“Lo,” I warn.
“If this is your room, then make me believe it.”
“Shut up,” I say instantly. I don’t even know why.
“That’s not very convincing.”
Is he being serious? “This is my room,” I say adamantly, wondering if that’s enough.
“It is?” he plays along, edging closer. “You don’t seem so sure.”
I try to reclaim my hands, but his grip tightens and he widens his stance so his feet trap me against the desk. Yes, this is just like the kitchen, only worse （or better） because I am not in control without my arms. Not one bit.
“Step back,” I try to sound forceful, but it comes off too raspy and too wanting.
“Why do you think this is your room?” he asks. “You don’t sleep here. You don’t fuck here. You don’t eat or drink here. What makes this yours as much as it is mine?”
“You know why,” I breathe. We’re pretending, aren’t we? I’m so confused. What is he to me right now? Friend, boyfriend, something else entirely?
“Once you stepped through that threshold,” Lo says, “you entered my place.” His hot, bourbon-scented breath hits my neck. “Everything in here belongs to me.”
My head lulls dizzily. I hate that I haven’t had sex today. I hate that my body wants Loren Hale. And maybe even my mind too.
I try to concentrate. I have to. “Take it down,” I say again.
“No, I like that photo and it’s staying there.”
Why does he care so much about that stupid picture?!
Before I ask, he spins me around and leans my stomach against his desk but keeps my wrists in his hands, pinning my arms to my back. I try to wiggle out of the hold, but he presses his body to mine, in a position that I’ve fantasized so many times. Just like this （maybe not the submissive part）， but with him behind me, his pelvis grinding into my backside. I gape, internally dying. Luckily he can’t see my open-mouthed expression.
I draw in a tight breath. “You’re being mean,” I tell him. He knows I haven’t had sex. When we were eighteen, he asked me what it felt like to go without climaxing for a day, and I told him it feels like someone is burying my head under the sand and pulling my limbs so tight they become taught rubber bands, waiting to be snapped and released. The cravings feel like drowning and being lit on fire at the same time.
He said he could relate to the paradox.
“I know you’re enjoying this.”
Yes, very much so. “Lo,” I breathe. “If you’re not going to have sex with me, you need to back away. Please.” Because I don’t think I can say no. My body wants him so badly that it trembles beneath his weight, but my head has become far more resilient. He’s just teasing me. That’s it. And I don’t want to wake up feeling ashamed about not stopping. He doesn’t like me like that. He couldn’t want someone like me.
He lets go and takes three steps back. I massage my wrists and set them on the desk, not facing him just yet. I collect my bearings—the places inside of me way too tempted right now. When I muster the courage, I spin around, my eyes livid. “What the hell is wrong with you?” He can’t use sex against me, not like that.
His jaw locks, and he spends a great deal of time pouring his next drink. He takes two large swigs and refills it before even beginning to answer me. “Don’t be so serious,” he says lowly. “I was just playing around.”
His words send arrows into my chest. It hurts. I know it shouldn’t. I wanted him to say, it was all real. I meant it. Let’s be together. I know that now, even if being together will bring a whole new set of complications. Instead, he reinforced our fa?ade. It’s all a lie.