“Your phone’s vibrating.” Her comment cuts into my thoughts.
Is that why her stare sharpened, or did she notice me wipe my hand? Why am I even this rattled? It’s not the first time I’ve had Atlantean blood on my hands.
“Probably Jeneva with more bachelorette information,” I grumble.
“It’s not messages, Cillian. It’s phone calls. It rang twice already.”
My eyebrows slam low as I throw my legs over the edge of the bed, plant my feet on the ground, and hinge at the waist to retrieve my sweatpants. By the time I’ve collected my phone, it started ringing again. One look at the unknown caller ID and the number of missed calls has my gut clenching.
What if it’s Sullivan? What if something happened to Quinn?
Once the call drops, I check for voicemails, but whoever’s calling isn’t leaving me messages.
“Everything all right?” Electra must’ve drawn herself up, because her breath brushes my shoulder.
“Yeah.” I shrug. “Just someone with the wrong number.”
“So it’s notJeneva with a J?”
I should appreciate her jealousy, but I’m too rattled to even acknowledge it. I glance over my shoulder to find her face leveled with my shoulder, lashes low like they’re trying to fence in her emotions.
“Do you want me to drive you home?” It’s not until the words leave my mouth and her head rears back that I realize how dismissive and cold they sound.
Jesus, I’m such a dick. This girl just lost her virginity to me, and here I am tossing her out. For all her insistence that she doesn’t want sweet and gentle, if she wanted an asshole, she wouldn’t be pining after broody, stand-up Malachi Hadez.
I toss my phone aside on the rumpled sheets, ruing having picked it up in the first place, and reach for her. Though my hands land, she pulls away.
“Unless you’ve changed your mind about spending the night?” Packaging it as her idea doesn’t improve my dismissal or her tanking mood. All it does is make me feel like a greater dick.
“No.” She maneuvers around me and climbs off the bed, forcing my hand off her body.
“Stay,” I whisper, my pulse drilling my veins.
When she bends to scoop her dress off the floor, my insides go cold, and I rip my fingers through my hair. How do I salvage this without coming off like some desperate, whiny man?
“Where’s my underwear?” she asks once clad in her tiny sequin dress.
Even though my mind is on my missed calls, my eyes are on her body.
As she roots around my jogger pockets, I catch her wrist. She knocks my hand aside.
My damn phone lights up and begins to vibrate again. When I catch the caller ID—unknown number—my heart stalls, and adrenaline flushes my veins.
“You should answer it,” Electra says flatly.
When I don’t, she grips my jaw, forcing my eyes to her glowing ones. “Answer your fucking phone, Cillian, and put it on speaker.”
A cold prickle crawls up my spine as I swipe the screen and tap speaker. “Hello?”
“Fucking finally,” the caller growls.
My nerves are so wired that it takes a second for my ears to catch up to who’s calling.
“Is Electra with you?” Malachi barks.
My adrenaline crashes so hard my already shitty vision wavers as I swing my face toward her.
It’s not Sullivan.
