Breathe Me (A 'Me' Novel) by Jeri Williams

had never heard him talk like that, then it hit me what he really said.
    “Fuck you, asshole. Like I was going to let him fuck me against a wall on the street,” I said. Now that Em and Matt were here, I felt like my normal, fake self again. And it didn’t escape me that once again I was indirectly being called a slut.
    “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded, Harley, I swear.” Matt tore his eyes away from his brother and looked apologetically at me. He could kiss my ass. People tended to say what they really felt in the heat of the moment, and it wasn’t like I could argue. To those who knew me , I was a slut.
    “That’s not what I was doing, dipshit,” Dek said darkly, still focused on his brother. He looked as if he wanted to stomp the shit out of Matt. The look he had was one I was all too familiar with—it was the look of unadulterated hatred, the look that said, “I wish I could rip out your vocal cords through your nose and get away with it.” And it was all directed at Matt. It made me uncomfortable.
    Ember placed a hand on Matt’s forearm as if to stop him from saying anything more. “What are you doing with him, Har? How do you even know him?” She eyed me speculatively. Just because she didn’t say it out loud, I knew she was thinking the same thing as Matt. I found yet another strange piece of casual ass and was getting ready to fuck him, and in this one case, she wasn’t far off the mark.
    “I met her in a store. So what?” Dek shifted his stance, widening his legs as if ready to pounce.
    “There’s a store for picking up ass? Again, no offense, Harley,” Matt said.
    This time, Ember hit him on the arm and gave him a warning look. At least she knew not to poke the bear.
    “Whatever. I have to go. I’ll talk to you later, Em.” I made no promises to the rest of them. I knew Mr. Too Good Too Be True was too good to be true. Of course a guy that hot was going to leave a trail of women in his wake. What would he possibly want with me, except the obvious? That was the one thing my mother was actually right about. I had to get away from here before I let the old nuances come back, before my walls came down.
    I turned and walked away without so much as a glance in his direction. I immediately felt him, his presence, following me.
    “What?” I turned to him. If he thought I’d give him the time of day now that I knew who he was, what he was, he was in for a little truth.
    “Whoa, hold up. It’s still late, and I wanted to make sure you got home all right.”
    “I can find it on my own, thanks, Dek .” I turned to leave, but he grabbed my wrist. In that moment, I had a flashback to when I was seven and had dropped a glass of milk on the floor. My mother not only made me squeeze the milk in a cup and drink it, but she also held my wrist so tight that it was bruised and sore for a week.
    I panicked and pulled back from Dek’s grip, fear making my heart spasm.
    His eyes darkened briefly before he raised his hands up, palms out, and said, “I’m not going to hurt you, Harley, and don’t call me that. My name is Deklan. No one calls me Dek except for Matty and…just don’t call me that.”
    “I’m sorry, I have to go, and my house is not that far. Thank you.”
    “Wait, what happened back there? Before my brother showed up, you wanted me to kiss you. I know you did. What changed?” He searched my face, as if looking for the girl he had pinned to the wall not more than ten minutes ago.
    I felt my ears warm with the embarrassment at the memory of my almost kiss. It would be a memory I would return back to.
    “Nothing. Contrary to what your brother thinks, I’m not a member of Sluts-R-Us,” I bit out. I had to be hard with this guy. I couldn’t let him in. He would be just like her—he would hurt me, and I couldn’t have that.
    “I could give zero fucks what my brother thinks about anything. As usual, he is clueless about everything. That’s not what I was doing with