I’m momentarily distracted by the sight of so much skin and muscle. I saw his chest earlier when he was getting stitched up, and its definition had made my stomach dip. I’d known Slate was well-built but hadn’t realized justhowwell-built until tonight. I also hadn’t realized how many scars he had—fresh and old ones.
So many old ones.
This really isn’t the moment to ogle a guy.Especially one who cares about another girl.I fling my gaze to the long oval mirror over my marble sink top. In the foggy glass, I catch the corners of Slate’s lips tipping up, accentuating the camber of his eyes.
“Mademoiselle de Morel, were you just checking me out?”
My cheeks redden. “No.”
“I don’t mind being objectified.”
Oh. My. God. I glower now, and not through the mirror this time.
His smile grows as he says, “If looks could kill . . .”
He’d be dead.
The same thought must occur to him because he shudders, losing both his smile and his proud bearing.
My arms loosen a little around the towel. Not enough for it to fall off, but enough for it to stop compressing all of my organs.
He starts to turn but stops. “Can I ask you something?”
Warily, I acquiesce.
“Were you mad at me earlier, or did I misinterpret your silent treatment?”
My cheeks prickle, and I don’t have to look in the mirror to know they’re pinkening. Again. Maybe they never stopped. I lower my gaze to the floor, to the mess of soiled towels balled up in one corner, and then farther, to the blackened toe of his left foot. I noticed it earlier, but now feels like the appropriate time to bring it up.
“What did thegroac’hdo to your foot?”
“That wasn’t her. That was all me.” I feel his gaze on my face. “I dropped something heavy on it.”
“Is it broken?”
“My toe or the—”
“Your toe.”
“Might be. Most of me feels broken.” He gestures to his body.
I see bruises but also flexing muscles, pebbling skin, and corded tendons. “Brume hasn’t been kind to you, huh?” My voice sounds so husky I pray he blames it on the emotional rollercoaster I’ve been riding since the piece showed up.
“It’s been . . . challenging, but not all bad.”
“What partwasn’tbad?”
For a long time, he’s quiet. So quiet I raise my gaze back to his.
“The cheese andchouchenlast night were nice.” He tilts his head to the side, and a black corkscrew slides across his forehead. “So, am I delusional, or were you angry with me?”
Over the water needling the marble, I let out a long sigh. “I wasn’t angry with you.”
He frowns, clearly dubious.
I want to pin my earlier bout of jealousy on something else,someoneelse, but curiosity is a cruel, crafty thing. “You mentioned you saw a girl in the well. Who was she?”
His black eyebrows almost collide over his nose, and his stance changes: his shoulders roll back, and his arms tense, the tendons straining. He looks like the terracotta statue my mother made of a Greek god when she was studying at the university. Even though I’ve asked Papa for it, asked him to display it in our outsized foyer, he refuses to remove it from where it sits in the college’s art department.
