I give him a look. “Do you have experience being roofied, Derek?”
His mouth quirks. “No.”
“Then how do you know what’s normal?”
“I watched you,” he says, and the words come out too honest to be strategic. Too immediate to be polished.
A beat.
He exhales slowly, as if he realizes what he just admitted.
“I watched you,” he repeats, quieter, “because I had to know you were okay.”
My heartbeat kicks.
I don’t trust my voice, so I take another sip of water.
Derek pushes off the doorway. He steps closer—not into my space, but nearer. Like he’s testing whether proximity makes me flinch.
It doesn’t.
That should alarm me more than it does.
“Mark and Alex went back to the club,” he says. “They met with security. The police report is filed. The guy’s name is in it.”
My fingers tighten around the glass. “You know his name.”
“Yes.”
“Did you—” I stop. Because what I want to ask is Did you hurt him? and I don’t actually want the answer if it’s yes.
Derek’s eyes hold mine. He answers the question I didn’t say.
“I didn’t touch him,” he says. “Not once.”
Relief and something darker tangle in my chest.
“But,” he continues, voice turning cold, “I will make sure he regrets trying.”
I swallow.
There’s the CEO again. The man who doesn’t just respond—he ends problems.
I should be scared of that.
Instead, a traitorous part of me relaxes.
“I should go home,” I say, because it’s the responsible thing. Because staying here feels like stepping into something I can’t back out of.
Derek doesn’t move. “Not yet.”
I blink. “Excuse me?”
His jaw tightens—annoyance flickering in first, like it always does with him, like irritation is his default shield.
Then something shifts behind his eyes.
Realization. Concern. Something that looks like he hates needing to feel it.
