My heart crashed against my ribs in shock. Delusion. Definitely had to be delusion.
The way he exhaled sharply, straightened too quickly, his careful mask slamming back into place—it hurtled me back to the almost-kiss we’d shared in my room when he’d thrown me on the bed and used me as a strange sort of painkiller.
I’d felt things that night.
I still felt those things but...I’d thought they were one-sided.
However, the way he watched me—the way the air went thick and tingly the longer we stared.
I stopped breathing.
He...he couldn’t feel the same, could he?
The thought was utterly absurd, yet...there was something...
The longer we stood there, just the two of us—like it had been for over a month—I began to wonder.
And my stupid, stupid heart skipped a beat.
“Now you look afraid.” His hair dangled over his forehead as he tipped close again. “What the hell is the matter with you?” His temper appeared. “Tell me.”
I shouldn’t.
I really shouldn’t but...I had no control when he looked at me like that: wary and guarded but intensely curious—like a feral animal wanting to trust but still unable to.
“I...”
“Yes?” He cocked an eyebrow.
My stomach fluttered. Did he have to be so effortlessly gorgeous? So dangerous to my sanity?
Common sense flew far, far away.
“I need to ask you a question,” I blurted.
His arms crossed tight across his chest, biceps straining against his black shirt. “What question?”
God, why?
Why did I say that?
I wanted to take it all back. To tell him to forget it but...after so long on my own. After accepting that I might never have the strength to care for someone again after losing my parents so horrifically, I didn’t want fear to stop me.
I didn’t care that I was trapped in here with him.
I didn’t care all of this was like some nightmarish fairytale.
For now, we had no choice but to be caged together but...what if we no longer had to be enemies?
Forcing myself to meet his eyes, I brought up the one thing I wasn’t going to. “You gave me your blood yesterday.”
His eyes narrowed. “So?”
“You only permit me to stay by your side—”
“Your point?”
“We’ve spent over a month together—”
“You’re saying you’re bored of me already?”
“And now...now you want to teach me things.” I swallowed hard. “What things?”
Sexual things?
Images exploded in my mind of him adding to my daily duties. Of requesting I service him in other ways.
I blushed as red as a rose.
Not because of the highlight reel my thoughts became on how I could serve him, but because I wasn’t running away screaming like I should.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Like what?” I squeaked.
“Like you expect me to order you to your knees and blow me.”
I choked. “A-Are you?”
“Wait.” He went rigid. “Is that what you were thinking?”
I looked away, my cheeks about to catch fire. I wanted to deny it. To bluster and deflect but my mouth betrayed me. “You did say you wanted to teach me something...”
“And you thought it meant how to fuck me?” He laughed bitterly, crossing his arms even tighter.
“Yes. I mean...no.” Nervousness made me trip over truth. “I mean, if you were going to add onto my duties...I suppose I would need to be taught.”
God, what are you saying?!
He went fatally, deadly, lethally still. “You’re saying you’re a virgin?”
My head pounded and a wave of vertigo had me wobbling on the spot. “I have zero experience in the bedroom if that’s what you’re asking.” My vision went a little hazy as my mouth decided to get me killed. “Kind of like you, I suppose.”
“What?!”
Oh my God, shut up!
A rush of sickness made me break out in a sweat. “I mean...it makes sense why you haven’t. I get why you haven’t but...if you’ve changed your mind, then—”
“You’ll help relieve me of my celibacy?” he said so quietly, so coldly it crackled with frost.
He’s going to kill me.
Even Whisper pushed himself between us as if trying to defuse the electrical tension.
My eyesight went grey on the edges; I tripped to the couch. Sitting heavily on the arm, I pressed my face into my hands.
It would be better if he did kill me.
At least then I wouldn’t have to die of embarrassment.
I felt him coming.
Felt the prickle of his energy as it reached out, snatched mine, and twisted us together with stinging chemistry.
“So you’ve avoided me all day—deliberately stayed outside and away from my company—because you think I’m going to drag you into my bed?”
I dared look up.
His face was black as a storm cloud. “Well?”
I didn’t know how long I would be able to withstand his temper and not blackout, but I did my best to be as honest as I could. Honesty was the only thing I had. The only thing that would hopefully save me. “I’ve heard the others gossiping about you. I know they all want to get pregnant and use you. So it makes sense that you flatly refuse to touch them, even though I’m sure you’re lonely.”
“I’d be very, very careful if I were you,” he breathed, his hands balling by his thighs.
I stupidly didn’t heed that warning, panic making me far too chatty. “Then again, you’ve almost eradicated all those who were trying to hurt you and the ones left behind are.... Well, those are the girls who are willing to look after you in any way you want.”
He physically shuddered as if the thought of letting any of them near him sent his skin crawling.
I hated that his reaction made my heart flutter.
That his revulsion to other women only added to my ridiculous notion that...I was different.
God, Rook, will you stop being such an idiot!
“Go on,” he commanded, his chest straining with a harsh breath.
I wanted the floor to open up and eat me.
“Y-You have to admit, we’ve spent a lot of time together lately. You don’t leave when I’m cleaning, you’ve let me into your world, and trust me to keep your secrets—”
“Finish what you were going to say.” His fists shook. “Before you can’t.”
I swallowed hard and had every intention of turning mute, but the final sentence fell off my tongue. “No matter how much you try to scare me, I’ve...grown used to you. I don’t think you’ll hurt me which makes me bolder than I should be. I’ve seen you at your weakest. I’ve seen the way you adore Whisper. I’ve seen you. But...you’ve also seen me. You’ve helped me when I was hurting and gave me your blood to prevent me hurting again. You do care, even if you pride yourself on making it seem like you don’t. Which makes me wonder if...”
“If?” he snarled.
Ugh, just get it over with, seeing as you were stupid enough to start.
Tipping up my chin, I announced, “If you have feelings for me.”
He didn’t move. Not even to breathe. “You’re asking if I like you? What are you? Twelve?”
I flinched as something dark and starving flickered in his stare before being smothered with a mocking scoff.
Before I could reply, he muttered, “Out of all the whores and killers they’ve sent me, you’re the weakest and most useless. You can barely stand upright when having a conversation. You have a tendency of stealing my wine and threaten to pass out if I so much as look at you wrong. You would rather nap than work and have an annoying little habit of distracting me.” He laughed softly. “Do you think I could like those qualities?” He stepped into me, tall and threatening. “That I could like you?”
Swooping to my feet, I backed up.
I almost fell over Whisper as he slunk to my side and pressed against me. “You don’t have to be cruel about it.”
“Is it cruel to tell the truth?”
“It’s cruel to take pleasure in it.”
“I’ve never felt pleasure,” he snapped. “Not once. Not a single fucking day have I ever experienced a single droplet of pleasure or happiness, yet here you are expecting me to command you to give me one.” Stepping into me, he flicked my forehead with his finger. “I fear for what’s going on in that broken brain of yours.”
I froze.
Did he just...flick me?
He shook his head with a chuckle as if my reaction amused him.
He acted like a schoolboy tugging the pigtails of the girl he liked.
It made me even more confused and—
“This is what I wanted to teach you,” he growled, yanking the dagger he’d stolen out of his waistband.
My mouth went dry as he held it up.
The metal glinted with the many lightbulbs from the chandelier above.
I stiffened. “What...what are you doing?”
“Stopping you from getting into even deeper trouble than you already are.” Running his thumb along the sharp edge, his eyes narrowed. “Romance is an utter waste of time. I have no interest in it. No desire to feel it. Just because I find comfort in your company doesn’t mean I want anything more than that.”
“You find comfort in my company?”
He drew himself up as if he hadn’t meant to say that.
His voice dropped to a growl. “You are here to do what I ask, that’s all. I will never ask you to sleep with me because the very idea of losing any more control than I already have sickens me.”
“Never say never,” I blurted stupidly.
God, why?
What is wrong with you?
The knife twinkled in his hand as he shook a little. “You truly have a death wish today, don’t you?”
“It’s your fault.” I groaned and hung my head. “What is it about you that makes me say things that I know are hazardous to my health?”
He gave a low, humourless laugh. “I don’t know...you tell me. You’re the only one reckless enough to talk to the monster everyone else wants to bleed to death.”
My heart physically hurt. “So you admit you’re not as cold-hearted as you pretend to be?”
“Oh, I’m not cold.” He shrugged a little too casually. “I burn every minute of every fucking day. The searing pain in my veins means I want nothing more than revenge on those who did this to me and if it wasn’t for the fact that your presence helps temper that pain, I wouldn’t bother being anywhere near you.” He grinned and traced the tip of the dagger along my neck. “Do you honestly think you would still be alive if I didn’t get some benefit from keeping you that way?”
I gulped, leaning away from the knife.
“I get it.” My chin strained upward, trying to avoid the cold kiss of metal. “I’ll stop. I’m sorry. I—”
“Quiet.” The dagger froze against my skin.
For a heartbeat, I thought he’d decided I wasn’t worth the trouble and decided to slit my neck, but a growl rumbled in his chest, exactly like Whisper.
Slowly, deliberately, he tilted my chin higher with the flat of the blade.
The cold edge pressed just below my jaw, angling my face into the light.
“Who,” he asked softly, almost politely, “did this?”