“You know…” I say after a while. “Even if hypnosis is a bust, I think we’ll be okay.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah,” I confirm, letting my head fall against the back of his. “Because we’ve got each other. And that’s more than enough.”
“You’re right.” I hear the smile in his words.
“I usually am.”
He laughs. “Charming.”
“Told you.”
“Thanks, Nova.”
“For what?”
“Believing in me,” he whispers.
“Always.”
“Wake up.”
My eyes snap open, and my mind is instantly a riot, torn between desperation to go back and confusion about where I am.
Ace.
The memory was so vivid. His voice, his smell, the feel of his hand all cling to me, and for once, I cling right back.
It felt too real, too alive, nothing like the blurred-out dreams I always have of him. The magnitude of it presses down on me. It takes everything in me not to let it show or let anything invade the gift of experiencing space with him, even if our time is long gone. I force myself to blink, shake it off, and push his memory away, even if I feel a lump in my throat.
Taking in reality, I clench my fists at what I find, what I suspect.
Did I say anything?
And why now?
Why didn’t his mind games trigger this memory when we were at Euphoria? Probably because it was all shock and adrenaline then. But now? Now, I feel almost comfortable.
“What did you do?” I launch the question—the demand—at Koen. I feel utterly exposed like I’ve been forced to reveal something private while also having no idea what he might have done to me while I was basically out of it. “What did you say?”
Koen stands there, looking at me questioningly. “Nothing, really. I just wanted to see if I’d be able to send you into a trance while you were still bickering with me. And I was successful. But you should have still had some sense of your surroundings.”
I grimace, unsure if it’s the trance or the memory, but I feel raw. No matter how hard I try to shove those feelings down, I know my face is anything but neutral.
“Which says more about you being open like a fucking book than him being that good,” Levi teases, his eyes twinkling with mischief, somehow reading my immediate thoughts.
I hate that he’s right. Ihatethat I’m so easily pulled under and let Koen have that kind of control over me. I bite the inside of my cheek, resisting the urge to rage.
“Maybe he’s just a fucking supernatural,” I quip snidely in a vain attempt to regain some control over the situation that has been out of my grasp from the start. “Ever thought about that?”
Koen bites his lips, and the way he looks at me as if he knows something I don’t only makes me angrier. “I’m as human as you are. It’s a skill, not a gift. There are things I’ve picked up that help. Reading a room, people’s body language…”
I can read people, too, but I’ve never put anyone into a trance because of it.
I want to scoff, but I hold it back. Koen’s eyes are on me, studying me. He’s dissecting me without even touching me. I want to give him nothing, so I cross my arms, trying to look unimpressed. “Body language? That’s all?”
He tilts his head, his gaze narrowing as if he’s already in my head. “Not exactly. Micro-expressions show a lot more than you think. They reveal what someone’s feeling, even when they’re trying to hide it. For example…” He steps closer, and I stiffen, but I don’t move back. He lifts his hand, lightly brushing his finger against the corner of my mouth. “Right here,” he murmurs. “That slight twitch… you’re intrigued but defensive right now. You’re competitive, unfiltered, and proud…” He pauses, his eyes searching mine. “But you’re also insecure. And lonely.” His eyes bore into mine, and my stomach clenches. “And you hate that I know that.”
