“I couldn’t resist.”
“I hope you’re satisfied.”
She was, but spared him and didn’t rub it in.
He left, the air between them settled and friendly once more. That said. . . their flirting was fun, but it felt a hollow, like an echo of what could’ve been there but wasn’t quite. Stress, Jo decided. The stress wasn’t making her want anything. Certainly, that was it.
Jo placed her hands on the keyboard and set to clearing that stress right from the root. The monitors flared to life. Well, all but one. Jo stared at it dumbly. It was the same one as before. She reached up and tapped the power button.
Nothing.
Jo tapped it again. Then gave a few raps on the side of the screen. It turned on with a suddenness that nearly blinded her. Squinting, Jo quickly adjusted the brightness, and set about her work. The mansion made everything realistic, down to the occasional technology glitch, it seemed.
The banter had, somehow, re-sorted the random tangents that cluttered her mind. Things were running smoothly again. Her magic felt like a marathon, rather than sprints. Jo drew on it at a consistent pace in the background of her mind, greasing the wheels but not using it for momentum. Her own talent was enough for that.
Overall, she moved more slowly, but with unwavering purpose. It wasn’t fueled with arrogance and fear like the frazzled machete-like approach she’d taken last time. No, Jo was beginning to wield her magic like a scalpel, striking only where she needed with absolute precision. Like this, absolutely nothing could stand in her way. It was as if just touching something caused it to unravel.
There were only two cans of RAGE ENERGY left in the fridge when Jo departed the recreation room for the third time in three days. Her more measured, direct approach yielded results. Isn’t that what Yuusuke had tried to tell her years ago? Approach it like playing the long-con, not the quick attack?
At least, she thought he’d said that. Trying to recall moments from her past life, her “real” life, was starting to become more and more difficult.
It was like trying to pick apart a hyper-vivid dream from a similar memory. Whenever her mind drifted to specifics, they seemed to waver and shift like two cells layered on top of each other. Was it Yuusuke’s advice she was following, or someone else whose name and face she’d already forgotten? When images of a long beard, a crowned head, and ornate clothing flashed across her mind’s eye, was that a memory, or a phantom image from a distant but lingering dream?
Jo rubbed her eyes. Being part of a society outside of time probably just had some unfortunate side effects, that’s all. And surely the supremely hazy memories of her best friend, the man she’d given up her existence for, were purely a result of exhaustion and not an actual loss of clarity.
Even if she worked fewer hours this time, the session was no less intensive than the last. Her mind felt like pulp, one even Eslar’s bedtime story may not be able to save.
Jo looked down the empty hall. There were no sounds echoing, no footsteps nearing, and the door to the other recreation room was void of a watch. It compelled her to check her own—just past three a.m., for whatever time was worth. Basically nothing, other than the arbitrary habits they still observed.
Which meant everyone was likely holed up in their own rooms, passing the time doing whatever they did. She knew where to find Wayne just like she knew he’d not mind her barging in on his space. Jo leaned against the door with a sigh. The thought was no more appealing than it was last time. Their conversation earlier had, indeed, sparked something in her. She wanted touch, but not Wayne’s.
Jo pressed her palm to her forehead with a sigh. Whatdidshe want then? Or rather,who?
When her hand pulled away, Jo looked left, not right, toward a white door at the opposite end of the hall. She was too old to be playing games like this. She knew what she wanted and she was in control of her emotions—most of the time.
But this? This was some odd magnetic vortex that drew her forward with an inexplicable force. Jo found herself toe-to-toe with Snow’s door, facing off like it was some wild beast. She remembered the last time she’d stood before his door, the cryptic answers that followed all the questions still swirling in her mind like unspoken taboos. Then there was the time he’d come to her in the night, making things all the more confusing.
Jo’s hand hovered. But when it fell, her knuckles didn’t meet the wood of the door. Jo’s fingers splayed out over the grain. She tipped her head forward, only realizing how warm she’d grown once her forehead met the cool, unblemished surface.
She was better than this. She wasn’t some lovesick teenager with raging hormones, debating how to get laid. Hell, she had a hot 1920s heartthrob waiting in a bed for her.
“I don’t know why I’m here,” Jo whispered.
Her eyes opened with purpose. No, she knewexactlywhy she was there. She knew what she wanted. She didn’t want cheap sex or empty intimacy. She wanted more than an itch scratched. She wanted to explore a connection with someone who had somehow managed to pull her in with nothing but a look. Snow and she weren’t anything, yet infinite possibilities stretched between them like a vast ocean.
Jo had a staring contest with the door as if it held all the secrets of the man within. But even if it did, it wasn’t betraying them to her. She started down the hall in the opposite direction, hands balled into fists.
Fine, she wanted Snow. She wanted to chart that sea of “maybes” and “what ifs” between them, even if it ultimately led nowhere. She was big enough to admit it to herself. Now, it was just a matter of figuring out how and when she was going to admit it to him.
Chapter 16
Useful Skill
JO DIDN’T GO back to her room that night.
It wasn’t that she didn’tlikeher room. It was lovely, like a picture. But it was also a picture that reminded her of the one night she’d spent with Wayne. Furthermore, like a picture, it was something that had little use. There was a bed (for all the sleeping she couldn’t do), a desk area (pointless, given everywhere else in the mansion), the wall where she’d hung her painting from Nico (nice, but she didn’t spend hours staring at it), and a small computer (that she’d long since deemed insufficient compared to the recreation room).
So, instead, Jo returned to the seat by the pool she had begun to frequent. Eslar’s book from earlier was still there, waiting for her right where she’d left it. Small orbs strung along the entrance into the living and kitchen areas lit the patio with just enough light to read by. While her mind felt too mushy to really grasp any of the words that her eyes fell over, it was repetitive, mindless, and blissfully passed the time.
