I glance at Cassian. Then out the window. Then back again.
He turns slightly, just enough to catch me in his peripheral. I give him an awkward, crooked smile.
He doesn’t return it.
In fact, he doesn’t return anything for the next fifteen minutes.
The silence builds between us like a wall. Or a wave. I can’t tell if he’s irritated, thoughtful, or just... simmering. But I can feel it pulsing off him, whatever it is.
It lasts long enough for the image in my head to start fading. Long enough for discomfort to take its place.
That’s when he clears his throat. His fingers tense around the steering wheel like he’s trying not to break it, and he shifts in his seat, jaw tight.
“If you’d asked him for clothes before they left,” he says, like the words have been sitting on his tongue too long, “I’m sure he would’ve given you something.”
It takes me a second to even catch the thread of what he means.
“Asked who?” I frown.
“Talon,” he mutters, not looking at me.
Talon?
I blink. Is he seriously circling back to him? In this context at that? We were only talking about him because we were talkingabout the car. And I really,reallydon’t want to think about him again.
“Uh, yeah, maybe,” I say. “They left kind of early though, didn’t they? Him and Nathaniel?”
“Yeah.”
Another beat of silence settles between us. Thick, heavy, and suffocating.
I glance down at the clothes I’m wearing. I thought he didn’t care, he said as much, pretty bluntly. But now… I’m not so sure. Did I take something that mattered? His favorite pants or something?
“Do you… want me to ask him for clothes?” I venture carefully. “So I wear his instead of yours?”
His grip on the wheel tightens. Just enough to make the leather creak.
“No,” he says. “Just think it’s weird he didn’t offer. You know, after you two fucked on our coffee table in the middle of the night.”
The words hit like a slap.
My breath hitches.
Slowly, carefully, I turn my head to look at him.
His face might as well be carved from stone.
But his voice?
That edge wasn’t just annoyance.
It was sharp. Raw. And unmistakably personal.
Is he... jealous?
I think back. To yesterday. To the car crash. The way he snapped when Talon started sweet-talking me in the backseat. The way his jaw clenched. The way he cut in like he couldn’t help himself.
And now this?
