After (The After Series)

Oh God, I am next. I gulp as Dan turns to me with the paper on his lips. I’m

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still not entirely sure what I am supposed to do, so I just close my eyes and go to
put my mouth on the other side and suck in. I feel hot air through the paper as
Dan blows onto it, but I can tell it’s too hard and there’s no way the paper won’t
fall. Right as I feel the paper hit my leg, I feel Dan’s hot breath as his mouth
moves closer to mine. The second his lips brush mine he is pulled away.
I open my eyes, but by the time my mind can catch up to what is happening,
Hardin is on top of Dan and has his hands latched around the guy’s neck.

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chapter eighty-four
I
scramble backward with my hands as Hardin lifts Dan’s head, his hands still
wrapped around his neck, and slams it down into the grass. For a second I
wonder if Hardin would have done the same were we on the concrete porch or
near the fire pit stones, and I feel like my answer comes in the form of Hardin
raising one fist high and slamming it into Dan’s jaw.
“Hardin!” I scream and climb to my feet. Everyone else just stares, Jace
seeming amused and even Ronnie entertained.
“Stop him!” I beg, but Jace shakes his head as Hardin’s fist connects again to
Dan’s already bloody face.
“This has been coming for a while; let them hash it out.” He smirks at me.
“Want a drink?”
“What? No, I don’t want a drink! What the hell is wrong with you!” I yell.
A crowd has now gathered around and people are cheering on the fight. I have
yet to see Dan hit Hardin, for which I’m glad, but I definitely want Hardin to
stop hurting Dan. I’m too afraid to try to stop him myself, so when Zed appears
in the yard, I yell for him. His eyes find me immediately and he jogs over.
“Stop him, please!” I yell. Everyone seems excited about this except me. If
Hardin keeps hitting him, he will kill him. I know it.
Zed gives me a quick nod and takes a few steps over to Hardin. He wraps his
fist into Hardin’s shirt and pulls him backward. Hardin is caught off guard, so
he’s easily separated from Dan’s prone body. Enraged, Hardin takes a swing at
Zed, but Zed dodges his fist and puts both of his hands on Hardin’s shoulders.

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He says something to Hardin that I can’t make out and then nods his head toward
me. Hardin’s eyes are blazing, his knuckles bloody and his shirt ripped from
Zed’s grip. His chest is pumping up and down rapidly, like he’s a wild animal
after a kill. I don’t make a move to walk toward him; I know how angry he is at
me. I can tell. I am not afraid of Hardin the way I probably should be. Even
though I just witnessed him completely losing his temper in the worst way
possible, I know that he would never physically hurt me.
With the excitement winding down, almost everyone begins to move back
inside the house. Dan’s crumpled body lies on the ground and Jace leans down to
help him up. He stumbles to his feet and lifts his shirt up to wipe his bloody face
off, spitting out a mixture of blood and saliva that makes me look away.
Hardin’s head turns to look where Dan is and he tries to take a step toward
him. Zed holds Hardin tight to stop him.
“Fuck you, Scott!” Dan yells. Jace steps between them. Oh, now he wants to
do something. “Just wait until your little—” Dan shouts.
“Shut the fuck up,” Jace snaps and Dan’s mouth closes.
Dan looks at me and I take a step back. I wonder what Jace meant by “this has
been coming for a while.” Hardin and Dan seemed fine together a few minutes
ago.
“Go inside!” Hardin yells, and I immediately know that he is talking to me.
I decide to listen to him, for once, and turn around and run into the house. I
know that everyone is staring at me but I don’t care. I push my way through the
crowded house and rush up to Hardin’s room. I must have forgotten to lock it
when I left, and, to add to my horror, there is a big red spot on the carpet.
Someone must have stumbled in here and spilled a drink on the tan carpet. Great.
I hurry to the bathroom and grab a towel and turn the sink on. I lock Hardin’s
door once I step inside and furiously wipe the stain, but the water only spreads
the spot and makes it much worse. The door clicks and I try to stand before he
enters.
“What the hell are you doing?” His eyes move to the towel in my hand then to
the spot on the floor.
“Someone . . . I forgot to lock the door when I went downstairs,” I say and
look at him. His nostrils flare and he takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” I say.
The anger is radiating off him and I can’t even be angry with him because all
of this is my fault. If I would have just listened to him and stayed in the room,
none of this would have happened.
He runs his hands over his face in frustration and I take a step toward him. His
fingers are busted and bloody, reminding me of his fight at the stadium. He
surprises me by grabbing the towel from my hands and I reflexively jump back a

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little. His eyes flash with confusion and he tilts his head slightly as he uses the
nonstained portion of the towel to wipe his knuckles off.
I expected him to barge through the door and break things while screaming at
me; instead I am granted with his silence, which turns out to be much worse.
“Could you please say something?” I beg.
His words come even slower than usual. “Trust me, Tessa, you don’t want me
to speak right now.”
“Yes, I do,” I tell him. I can’t stand his angry silence.
“No, you don’t,” he growls.
“Yes, I do! I need you to talk to me, tell me what the hell happened down
there!” I wave my hands toward the window and he clenches his fists by his
sides.
“Goddamn it, Tessa! You always have to push and push! I told you to stay in
my fucking room—multiple times—and what the fuck did you do? You didn’t
listen, as usual! Why is it so damn hard for you to listen to what I say?” he yells
and slams his fist against the side of his dresser, cracking the wood.
“Because, Hardin, you don’t just get to tell me what to do all the time!” I yell
back.
“That isn’t what I am doing. I was trying to keep you away from shit like what
just happened. I already warned you that they aren’t a good group of people, yet
you prance out there with Jace and then volunteer yourself to play that fucking
game! What the fuck was that?” The deep veins in his neck are straining against
his skin so tightly that I fear they may break through.
“I didn’t know what the game was!”
“You knew I didn’t want you to play, and the only reason you wanted to play
was because Molly’s name was mentioned because of this crazy obsession you
have with her!”
“Excuse me? Crazy obsession? Maybe I don’t like the fact that my boyfriend
used to sleep with her!” My cheeks flame. My jealousy and dislike toward Molly
are a little crazy but Hardin just choked a guy for almost kissing me.
“Well, sorry to break it to you, but if you’re going to have a problem with
everyone that I slept with, you may want to transfer schools,” he exclaims and
my mouth falls open. “You didn’t have a problem with the girls downstairs,” he
adds and my heart goes frantic.
“What girls?” My breath catches. “Those three that were playing with us?”
“Yeah, and just about every other girl in this place.” His voice holds no
emotion as he glares at me.
I try to come up with something to say but I am at a loss for words. The fact
that Hardin has slept with all three of those girls and basically the entire female

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population at WCU makes me nauseous—and the worst part is how he just
threw it in my face. I must look like such a fool hanging around Hardin when
everyone else figures I’m just one of the many girls he’s slept with. I knew he
would be pissed-off, but this is too far, even for Hardin. I feel like we have gone
back in time to when I first met him and he would purposely make me cry on an
almost daily basis.
“What? Surprised? You shouldn’t be,” he says.
“No.” And I’m not surprised, not one bit. I’m hurt. Not about his past, just the
way he treated me out of anger. He said it that way just to hurt me. I blink
rapidly to stop the tears from coming, but when it doesn’t work I turn away and
wipe my eyes.
“Just go,” he says and walks toward the door.
“What?” I ask and turn to face him.
“Just go, Tessa.”
“Go where?”
He doesn’t even look at me. “Back to your room . . . I don’t know . . . but you
can’t stay here.”
This is not at all what I thought would happen. The pain in my chest grows
with every second of silence that passes between us. Part of me wants to beg him
to let me stay, and to argue with him until he tells me why he reacted the way he
did downstairs, but a bigger part of me is embarrassed and hurt by his cool
dismissal. I grab my bag off the bed and sling it over my shoulder. When I reach
the door, I look back at Hardin and hope that he will apologize or change his
mind, but he turns to the window and completely ignores me. I have no idea how
I will get back to the dorms, since Hardin drove me here and I had every
intention of staying the night with him. I don’t remember the last time I stayed
alone in my room, and the thought unnerves me. The drive to this house seems
like days ago, instead of hours.
When I reach the bottom of the stairs, someone tugs at the back of my
sweatshirt, and I hold my breath as I turn around, silently praying that it isn’t
Jace or Dan.
It’s Hardin. “Come back upstairs,” he says, his voice desperate and his eyes
red.
“Why? I thought you wanted me to leave.” I stare at the wall behind him.
He sighs and grabs the bag from my shoulder and walks back up the stairs. I
think about just letting him have the bag and leaving anyway, but my stubborn
attitude is what got me in this situation in the first place.
I huff and follow him back to this room. When the door closes he turns around
and backs me up against the door.

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He looks into my eyes. “I’m sorry.” He pushes his hips against mine and puts
one of his arms against the door close to my head so I can’t move.
“Me, too,” I whisper.
“I just . . . I lose my temper sometimes. I didn’t really sleep with those girls.
Well, not all three of them.”
I feel a little relieved but not completely.
“My first instinct when I get angry is to come back even harder, to hurt the
other person as much as I can. But I don’t want you to leave, and I’m sorry for
scaring you by beating the shit out of Dan. I am trying to change, change for
you . . . to be what you deserve, but it’s hard for me. Especially when you do
things to purposely piss me off,” he says. He brings his hand to my cheek and
wipes the drying tears left there.
“I wasn’t scared of you,” I say.
“Why not? It seemed like you were when I grabbed the towel.”
“No . . . well, I was a little when you grabbed the towel, because of the stain
on the floor. But really I was more afraid for you when you were fighting Dan.”
“Afraid for me?” He puffs his shoulders up a little and brags, “He didn’t get a
hit on me.”
I roll my eyes. “I meant that you would end up killing him or something. You
could get in a lot of trouble for assaulting him,” I explain.
Hardin chuckles. “Let me get this straight: you were worried about the legal
repercussions of our fight?”
“Stop laughing. I’m still mad at you,” I tell him and cross my arms. I’m not
exactly sure what I am upset about except him telling me to leave.
“I am still pissed at you, too, but you’re very amusing.” He presses his
forehead against mine. “You drive me crazy,” he says.
“I know.”
“You never listen to me and you always fight me on everything. You are
stubborn and borderline intolerable.”
“I know,” I repeat.
“You provoke me and cause me a shitload of unnecessary stress, not to
mention you almost made out with Dan right in front of me.” His lips touch my
neck and I shiver.
“You say the most annoying things and you act like a child when you’re mad.”
Despite the insults he is throwing at me—complaints about things that, deep
down, I think he really enjoys about me—my stomach is fluttering as he kisses
my skin and continues his light verbal assault. He pushes his hips against mine
again, more forcefully this time.
“But all that being said . . . I also happen to be vigorously in love with you,”

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he says and sucks harshly on sensitive skin below my ear.
I push my hands through his hair, making him groan, and he puts both of his
hands on my waist, pulling me to him. I know there are more things to be said,
more problems to be solved, but right now all I want is to get lost in Hardin and
forget about tonight.

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chapter eighty-five
I
n what feels like a desperate attempt to be closer to me as we kiss, Hardin
moves a hand to the back of my neck. I can sense all of his anger and frustration
being transferred into lust and affection—his mouth is hungry and his kisses
sloppy as he walks backward with our lips still attached. He guides me with one
hand on my hip and the other behind my head, but I trip over his feet and
stumble just as his legs reach the end of his bed, causing both of us to fall back
onto it. In an attempt to wrestle control from him, I straddle his torso and pull
my sweatshirt and tank top over my head at the same time, leaving me in my
lacy bra. His eyes widen and he tries to pull me down to kiss him, but I have
other plans.
Reaching behind my back, my rushed fingers find my bra clasp and I unsnap
it before pulling the straps down my shoulders and letting it drop to the bed
behind me. Hardin’s hands are warm as he reaches up and cups my breasts in his
large palms, kneading them roughly. Grabbing his wrists, I remove his hands
from my skin and shake my head. His head tilts in confusion before I climb
down his body and unbutton his pants. He helps me tug them down to his knees
along with his boxers. My fingers immediately grip his length—he gasps, and
when I look at his face his eyes are closed. I pump slowly before dipping down
and bravely taking him into my mouth. I try to remember his instructions from
last time and repeat the things that I know he liked.
“Fuck . . . Tessa,” he pants and wraps his hands into my hair. This is the
longest he has been silent during any sexual experience we have shared, and I

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realize much to my own amusement that I missed his dirty words.
I move my body while continuing to please him and end up between his
knees.
He sits up and watches me. “You look so sexy like this, with that smart mouth
of yours wrapped around me,” he says and grips my hair harder.
I feel the heat gathering between my legs and move my head faster, wanting to
hear him moan my name again. My tongue laps around the tip of him and he lifts
his hips slightly off the bed, pushing himself down my throat. My eyes begin to
water and I can barely breathe, but hearing my name fall from his lips over and
over again makes it that much better. Seconds later, he removes his hands from
my hair and cups my face, stopping me from moving further. The metallic scent
of his bloody knuckles hits my nose, but I ignore the reflex to pull away.
“I’m going to come . . .” he tells me. “So if there is anything else you . . . you
know, want to do before then, you should stop blowing me.”
I don’t want to speak, to give away how desperate I am to have him make love
to me, so I simply stand up and slide my jeans down my legs and step out of
them. When I begin to remove my panties Hardin’s hand reaches out and stops
me.
“I want you to leave these on . . . for now,” he coos. I nod and gulp,
anticipation consuming me. “Come here.” He gestures and pulls his shirt over
his head. Scooting to the edge of the bed, he pulls me onto him.
Our feverish exchange in the beginning has slowed and the angry tension
between us has decreased. Hardin’s chest is flushed and his eyes are wild. The
feeling of sitting on his lap while he is completely naked and ready—and I am
only dressed in panties—is exquisite. He presses the small of my back, the
length of his one outstretched hand there holding me in place as his lips meet
mine once again.
“I love you,” he whispers into my mouth as his fingers move my panties to the
side. “I . . . love you . . .”
I gasp at the immediate pleasure of the intrusion. He moves his fingers slowly,
too slowly, and I instinctively rock back and forth to create a faster pace.
“That’s it, baby . . . fuck . . . You’re always so ready for me,” he groans and I
continue to rock against his hand. My breathing and moans intensify—it still
surprises me how quickly my body responds to Hardin. He knows every little
thing to do and say.
“You are going to listen to me from now on. Am I right?” he says against my
neck, gently biting the skin.
What?
“Tell me you will listen to me or I won’t let you come.”

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