He mightlike it,but I feel anobsessiongrowing deep inside my bones, staring at all the shades of a color I wasn’t even sure I enjoyed. Perhaps it’s the pink blankets thrown in that really grab me, or maybe all the books. The sense of calm, or the fact that when I inhale deeply, catching the scent of old pages and fresh earth, I turn my head and find Sullen—despite all there is to see here—staring only at me.
“Stein rarely entered this room.My mother decorated it. When she was here, she was in it. But now, it kind of reminds me of you.” He watches me from the black velvet chair, too much space between us.
I clutch the wine glass in my hand, legs curled up to my chest, pink throw over my body as I stare at him in the ethereal room, the two of us tucked into a corner near the back, books lining the space behind me.
“How?” I ask him, grateful we skipped talking about anything that came before this. It is late, or early—I don’t know,and I don’t care—and there are so many things to discuss and question and dissect, and for one hour or one moment or maybe even, if we’re lucky, the remainder of the night, I want to talk about none of them.
I swallow a mouthful of the red Cosmo picked out and wonder if he has Sanford Rule under control. I wonder, too, if others are here. Maude and the rest from the Emporium. Did Cosmo command them here?
But it’s another thing I don’t want an answer to.
Not yet.
Sullen lifts his chin, staring down at me, his gloved hands on the arms of the high-backed chair.
He looks like a king, and he has no idea.
But when he speaks, I think he sounds more like abrat.“Can you stay away?” His dark eyes drift to the wine in my hand at the exact moment I take another drink, relishing in the way it burns down my throat.
I tip the glass up higher just to irritate him, arching my brow as I do. Finally, I lower it, fingering the stem of the glass, resisting the urge to reach for the bottle perched on the end table beside me, the soft lavender glow turning the black sofa a shade of deep blue midnight.
“I can,” I answer him as I hold his gaze. “But why should I want to? I have had a miserable day.”
He only stares at me blankly, expression unreadable.
“You drugged me,” I say quietly, feeling suppressed anger rising to the surface. Before, when he led me to a room to rest, I was too overcome with artificial exhaustion to question or accuse. Now, I am drained yet wide awake. “Again.”
“No,” he says, his voice strangely soft as he stares at me. It’s hard now to see the man who held a knife to his own throat, bowed naked on the floor. He looks colder. Distant. Different. “Ididn’t.” There is a warning in his tone, but I don’t know who or what for.
“I woke up on the floor.” I make my own voice icy, despite the flush coursing through me now, causing my pulse to beat in my ears. Cosmo was right. I do need fucking water. How irritating. “I don’t sleep that heavily, Sullen.”
“You slept deeply enough last night,” he observes as my face grows hotter. “I touched you, traced your ribs, your arm.” He glances at my shoulder. The injured one. “I could have fucked you in your sleep. I don’t think you would’ve woken.”
“Why didn’t you?” I challenge, meeting his crassness head-on. Despite the ways I stood up for him and fought for him and cleaned up his mess, there are questions he owes me answers to. Maybe some truths I do want tonight, after all.
He doesn’t flinch with my words. “I was satisfied,” he says simply, a soft smile tugging at his mouth.
I feel my throat grow tight as I let my gaze drop to the black bandana on his throat, the red hoodie revealing the outline of his muscular body. “Who drugged me?” I force myself to ask.
A bone jumps in his jaw. “Sanford,” he admits, and it sounds like the truth.
A spike of irritation cuts through me but instead of speaking anything, I throw back the wine, then lean over to pour more.
“Karia,” Sullen whispers, and the ache in the way he says my name pulls at my heart.
But I don’t care. He can’tKariame out of this.
I have woken up on the floor to a puddle of blood, nearly been decapitated, visited by someone I don’t think is a friend any longer—holding a knife in his hand, no less—and cleaned up piss from the man I think I might love, all in the span of one night.
I deserve to get wasted. I slosh the contents of nearly the entire bottle into my glass, then cradle it between my fingers like it’s precious, before I resume my position on the couch.
The scent of dark fruit clouds with the earthy, bookish air of the room and I keep my gaze on the blood-red liquid, but I don’t drink. Not yet.
He has sway over me even when I despise it.
I’m still going to swallow all of this though—I don’t waste alcohol—but maybe I can pause, if only for a moment.
“Why did you decide to come here? What did the two of you speak of across the room from me? Did he tell you he was going to drug me?”
