Chapter 48 Sloane
Sloane
“What the hell was that?”
When Zeth comes back to the room later in the day, he doesn’t look happy.
In fact, he’s furious. He’s had nearly eight hours to calm down since Jacob’s office this morning, but from the storm cloud over his head, he’s been itching to ream me out ever since.
He stalks into the room and stands in front of me where I’m lying on my stomach on the bed, new phone in hand.
He leans down, placing his hands on either side of me, glaring at me with a level of intensity that makes goose bumps break out across my skin.
“What are you doing, Sloane?”
“I’m texting my dad to make sure your friend is still alive. That okay with you?”
The anger temporarily fades from his eyes. “And is she?”
“Yes.”
“Give me the phone.”
“What?”
“Give me the phone.”
He tries to take it from me, but I sit up, holding it protectively against my chest. “I don’t think so. I’ve had enough of you stealing my phone.”
“Sloane, just…” He stops himself. Scrubbing his face with his hands and then his head, he growls under his breath. “Just tell me what she’s been doing.”
“She’s been helping my dad prepare for his church youth camp.”
Zeth’s face goes slack. I think I’ve just broken his brain. “Sorry, what?”
“Church. Youth. Camp.” Those are the three words that matter, I think. I haven’t told him that my dad’s planning on taking Lacey with him to the camp yet. I don’t know how well that will go down.
“And she’s okay with that?” Zeth asks.
“She says she is in her text message.”
“Oh my God, just give me your fucking phone!” He lunges for it again, and this time I let him have it.
He seems genuinely worried about the girl, and me being pissy with him is only making matters worse.
I shouldn’t do it. I should be doing everything I can to soothe him after the stunt I pulled earlier, but instead I feel like baiting him.
Pissing him off some more. Seeing just how far I can push.
The problem is I’m still mad at him. Because of this morning, when he showed a side of himself I didn’t think could exist. A sweet, vulnerable side that made my chest hurt.
“You’re confusing me.” That’s what he’d said as he let me stroke his back, his hair.
As he’d held on to me, still inside me, after we’d just had crazy, confronting sex.
And then he had promptly dragged that side of himself back into the dank, dark dungeon where he keeps it locked up and gone back into asshole mode.
And I know I didn’t imagine it. Zeth Mayfair does have a vulnerable side.
I watch him as he scrolls through my messages to both Lacey and my dad, observing his reactions. I know what he’s reading:
Lacey:
You used to really like pink, huh?
Me:
Yep. I also used to like NSYNC and dungarees.
Lacey:
Yeah. Your mom showed me pictures.
Me:
She refuses to let me live that down! I’m gonna burn those pics.
Lacey:
Don’t. She’ll be devastated. She’s really lovely. Your dad, too. He’s got me pitching tents with him all day today.
Me:
Make sure he’s not using you for slave labor, Lace. If you leave, just let me know and I’ll send in a rescue, okay?
Lacey:
It’s fine. I like it. It’s fun. Say hey to Zee for me?
And then, of course, there are the messages from my dad.
Dr. Sloane, MD:
Your mother caught her crying in the bathroom this morning. You didn’t tell me, so I won’t pry, but this girl seems a little broken?
Me:
A little, yes. But don’t go trying to fix her. She’s already seeing someone for that.
Dr Sloane, MD:
They aren’t doing a very good job.
Me:
Just keep her busy, okay?
Dr Sloane, MD:
Already on it, kiddo.
I thank the stars that Lacey didn’t write “say hey to my brother” instead of Zee in her message.
That would be a rough way for him to find out the truth—that the young girl he’s been watching over for the past six months is actually his blood relative.
His sister. Zeth looks adorable as he frowns over my phone, rereading the texts. Adorable, in a terrifying kind of way.
“Is he gonna try and convert her?” he asks.
I shrug. “He might ask her what she believes. He won’t push, though. He’s not like that.”
Zeth just nods at this. I can’t tell what he’s thinking.
He’s withdrawn to someplace deep within himself.
Somewhere I’d have trouble reaching him.
And then, just as quickly, he seems to realize what’s happened and he surfaces again, tossing back my phone.
“You didn’t answer my other question. What the hell did you think you were doing this morning? ”
I’m beginning to think this guy is bipolar.
He swings so wildly from one attitude to the next.
I didn’t see it at first. He just seemed arrogant and pissed off all the time, but I’ve begun to realize something: His negative emotions are his anchors.
They keep him from drifting off someplace he doesn’t want to go.
Maybe the place he drifted to just now? Does he know he’s developed this coping mechanism? I doubt it.
“Jacob knew I wasn’t some single-brain-celled idiot, Zeth. There was no point in lying to him about it.”
“So you lie to him about me instead. He knows me. He knows I would never…” He starts pacing, working on wearing a hole in the polished floorboards.
“You would never what?”
“I would never submit to a woman. Not like that.”
“That’s bullshit. You told me to own you when we first…”
Zeth raises an amused eyebrow at me. “Fucked? See, you can’t even say it.
That’s why I told you to own me. Because having you try was just too delicious.
You’re so uncomfortable in your own skin.
I just wanted you to break free from that.
If I played a little game with you so you could do that… ” It’s his turn to shrug now.
I glare at him, my temperature rising. “I’m not uncomfortable in my own skin. Out of the two of us, you’re the one who isn’t at home in his own body.”
A shit-eating grin spreads across his handsome, incredibly annoying face. “Have you seen me, sweetheart?” He spreads his arms wide. “I look like a fucking Abercrombie and Fitch model.”
Oh, the smug, smug bastard. “No, you don’t! You look like a fucking criminal. You are a fucking criminal.”
“A criminal who models for Abercrombie and Fitch?”
“Urgh!” I contemplate throwing my phone at him but then think better of it.
I hurl a pillow at him instead, and it hits his head—way less satisfying than the phone would have been.
He’s too busy laughing at me to care, anyhow.
I suddenly realize what he’s doing. He’s actually laughing.
Laughing, like a normal person. My anger vanishes.
I sit in silence, stunned over how surprising the moment is.
He picks up the pillow from the floor at his feet, still chuckling a little.
He tosses it back on the bed, unaware of the reaction he’s caused in me.
“Well, regardless of the why, you’ve landed us in a mighty fucking awkward situation now, Sloane Romera.
You should have just blown me and been done with it. ”
“What?”
He paces to the closet where he packed away his black duffel this morning, and surprise, surprise, pulls the damn thing out again.
My palms start sweating at the very sight of it.
“We have to figure out how to make Jacob believe you’re as ballsy as you made yourself out to be; otherwise, we’re both in a lot of fucking trouble, aren’t we?
He’s already suspicious as fuck about me.
Especially now he knows Michael isn’t here spying on me for Charlie. ”
“Wait, what? Michael’s here? Your Michael?”
Zeth snorts, carrying his black bag to the bed and unzipping it beside me. “He’s checked into the room two doors down from us, swanning around like he owns the place.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t need to.” Zeth’s amusement levels seem to have evened out again. He turns to face me, done fiddling with his duffel of tricks. “All you need to do is take something out of this bag and use it on me. And make me believe it.”
“Uhh…”
“Right now.”
“I… I can’t. It’s not that simple, Zeth. I can’t just decide to—”
He lunges for me, placing a hand over my mouth. “Stop talking.” He climbs up onto the bed, hovering over me, his face a short inch away from mine. “Stop. Talking. Start. Doing.”
Despite his command, I see in his eyes that he thinks I will fail at this task.
This is exactly the same thing as his telling me to own him.
He thinks I’m too self-conscious to do it.
Well, fine. He wants me to start doing? I’ll give him what he wants, and he will not fucking like it.
His hand’s still over my mouth, so I turn my head and bite down on his index finger.
“Sloane.”
I bite harder, staring him straight in the eye. His mouth twitches, but he doesn’t say anything else. I have to release him for the next part. There are small red wheels on his finger as he pulls his hand away. Good. It’s about time I marked him for once.
“Get off me,” I command.
He narrows his eyes. “Why?”
“Don’t ask questions. Do as you’re told.”
He smiles, wolfish and dangerous. I take that smile straight off his face when I slap him with my open palm. Hard.
“You need me to ask you again?” I demand.
My cheeks are burning so hot that I must look ridiculous, bright red and flustered, especially with my chest rising and falling so quickly.
Zeth isn’t looking at my chest or my cheeks, though.
He’s looking me straight in the eye, transfixed.
I can see him warring with himself over what I’ve just done.
He hates my slapping him. I already know that from past experience.
And yet, this is his own doing. He’s told me to do this.