Anything to distract me from the alien sensation ofAlexeipressed up against me, his skin cold where Mateo was a furnace of joy.
A shudder passed through him too. He dropped his head to my shoulder and took a breath before he faced me again. “I have two reasons if you really want to hear them. One, that child has never been to school. Her education has been sporadic and I have it on good authority that you are an excellent teacher. The second reason is simply that she asked for you.”
The lift stopped.
I waited for Alexei to pull away.
Again, he didn’t. He took my arm and tugged me onto a landing that was a hundred times fancier than downstairs. Pushed me against the wall as if he was going to kiss me, then at the last possible moment reared away, yanking me to the solitary door in the spacious landing.
He dug in his pocket for keys and opened up, pulling me inside. The mask slipped and he recoiled from me like he’d been burned.
“Nice.”
Alexei took a breath, eyes closed, then pushed off the closed door and stepped into what I realised was a bathroom.
He washed his hands.
Twice.
Oh. He had OCD. That made sense.
“Do not dissect me.” Alexei reappeared like a ghost. “You will not like what you find.”
“I’m not. I was comparing you to Saint. He doesn’t like touching me either.”
“That is different.”
“How?”
We had a million other things to talk about, but it mattered to me. I loved Saint, I loved Alexei, and I wanted to understand them better.
“It is different for Saint because he is afraid he will like it and someone will take it away. Or he believes you are trying to kill him. There is not much in between. For me, it is more that I think everything is dirty and I cannot have it on my skin.”
I absorbed that, but there was a soft knock at the door before I could comment.
Alexei whipped around and opened it.
Liliana slipped inside, then Juana, and finally Rubi. They looked calm. Happy, even.
Liliana came to me, eyes wide, and took my hand. “Will you draw with me?”
Her voice was as glittery as the hairband still stuffed in my bag. As terrifying. I wanted to wrench my hand free and run a fucking mile. To bury my head in a big black hole and pretend this sweet, sparkly creature didn’t exist. But as her amber eyes took me hostage, something visceral inside me shifted. Melted. Evaporated like it had never been there, taking the barbed stress in my gut with it.
He loves you. He told you so.
And god, I loved him.
I lovedher.
My heart just didn’t know it yet.
22
MATEO
Two weeks.
The bottle of cheap whisky sat on the bar. It was Rubi’s officialbad moodwhisky, but he wasn’t here to drink it.
