“To say I’m sorry,” I rasp. “To tell you I was wrong for running out when I owed you a proper conversation. To tell you I’m coming home.”
“You’ve changed your mind about hunting those men down?”
“No, I?—”
“Then it’s cool,” he cuts in. Brutally. Cruelly. Painfully.
“C-cool? What’s cool?”
“You and me.”
“Archer—”
“You should stay at the apartment tonight.”
And just like that, my heart shatters. “What?”
“Don’t come back to the house. We’re taking time, remember?”
A knock on my window makes me jump, gasping and wrenching left until I come eye-to-eye with a violently seriousman dressed in a sharp, black suit. His dark stare. His rigid lines.
“Don’t forget to infuse tonight,” Archer bites out. “Eat first.”
And then he hangs up.
For the first time since I’ve known him, he cuts me off and slices deeper than anyone else ever has. Deeper than anything I’ve ever experienced in my life.
The guard, one whose name I don’t even know, opens my door just two inches, his voice as hard as his boss'. “I’m gonna follow you home, Doctor Mayet.”
My stomach swirls. My head thumps. Pain throbs in the back of my skull, like a thousand beating drums intent on sending me over the edge of insanity. My hands shake. My arms. My legs.
My entire fucking existence trembles and aches.
Bringing tear-filled eyes up again, I choke out a pathetic, “You’re following me home?”
“To the apartment.” He tilts his chindowntown. “Let’s go. Idling in the heat is bad for the car.” Closing the door again, he strides back to his SUV and slides in. Gripping the wheel at ten and two, he stares. And waits. Glowers, and when I don’t move, flashes his high beams in lieu of honking the horn.
Don’t come back to the house.
Archer’s voice plays on repeat in my mind, carved deep into my psyche.
Don’t come back to the house.
The day I feared has arrived. The break I was so intent on not feeling… a million times worse than I expected.
Don’t come back to the house.
ARCHER
“What the fuck was that?” Cato stalks through the doorway and into the room at the front of the house. The one with the massive fireplace and wingback chairs. The one with the piano.
The one where my father once conducted meetings and destroyed lives.
I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
Slamming his hands onto my chest, Cato knocks me back a step. “Don’t come back to the house? Are you fucking braindead?”
“Don’t.” I turn to the fireplace and give him my back. Perfect opportunity for him to shoot me while I’m not looking; it would hurt less than my current predicament. Crushing my phone in my left palm, I place both hands on the thick cherry mantel and squeeze until my knuckles glow white. When that doesn’t help, I close my eyes and pray the ache between my ribs dissipates soon.
