Chapter 36
Chapter
Thirty-Six
The scowl Donovan levels me with when he sees me with Cooper could freeze hell over. But by the time I manage to yank my hand out of his asshole brother’s, he’s long gone.
I resolve to explain—somehow—when we’re at the retreat together. The whole time I pack, following the instructions on Ethan’s assistant’s comprehensive list, I try to figure out how. It’s probably for the best: the more pissed off Donovan is at me, the less our combustible chemistry will matter to him, even if we’re stuck atop a mountain together. I just don’t want him to be angry at me over a lie.
The good news is, all night long, no one shows up on my doorstep to yell at me or deliver disturbing revelations about my life. No one posts more photos of me and Donovan in a compromising position, and despite Charlotte’s gleeful texts, I ignore the comments on the #ronovan Facebook post. (Thanks a lot, D’Andre.) No premonitions ambush me all night or on the drive up to Granville Falls, where I blast Born This Way in defiance of my fate.
The retreat center is gorgeous, located atop a mountain with stunning views in every direction, rustic log cabins, and sprawling meadows edged by woods. In my room, I tuck my jeans into the dresser and stow my toiletries. Then, at ten on the dot, I walk into the main lodge.
The first thing I see is Donovan, standing in front of the wall of windows that overlooks the mountain backdrop, backlit and looking unfairly handsome. He’s wearing a forest-green Henley, which clings to his chest in ways that ought to be illegal, and his jaw is clenched, Heathcliff-on-the-moors-style.
Swallowing hard, I force myself to take in the rest of my surroundings. There are twelve of us total—ten employees, plus Ethan and the facilitator. I only know two of them: Georgia, of sex-spreadsheet fame, and Jill, who once called Donovan sexy as sin but cold as ice. He lives up to his name, stubbornly refusing to so much as look in my direction.
I need to apologize to him. But this isn’t the time. Instead, I give myself strict instructions: 1) Observe all attendees closely for suspicious behavior, 2) Explain to Donovan about Cooper but do not kiss him, no matter what, 3) Try not to humiliate myself in spectacular fashion.
And then, because God hates me, the first team-building exercise I have to do on the retreat is the human knot…with Georgia, Jill, Dean from IT, and the Ice Man himself.
“Here’s the deal,” Rosa, the chirpy retreat leader, says from the front of the room. She looks like she’s lifted straight from a Disney movie, her blonde hair scraped back into a perfect ponytail and her brown eyes bigger and shinier than eyes have any right to be. I half-expect little birds to start buzzing around her head. “Each of you grabs the left hand of someone across the circle from you, using your own left hand. Then you do the same thing with your right. After you’ve done that, your goal is to use verbal communication to disentangle yourselves, so that you wind up in your original circle. There’s only one rule: you can’t let go.”
I gape at her, dismayed, but it’s Donovan who speaks. “You want us to what ?” he says, each syllable a gravelly scrape of horror.
“I’ll demonstrate.” Rosa bounces in our direction like an overly caffeinated, Sephora’ed kangaroo. “What’s your name?” she says, coming to a stop next to him.
Donovan looks even more horrified than before. “Donovan Frost,” he mutters, so low she has to ask him to repeat himself.
When I first met Donovan, I would’ve thought he was just being an ass. But now, I know he’s shy. A day of icebreakers and forced teambuilding is basically his worst nightmare. Add in my presence, and he’s entered the ninth circle of Hell.
I feel awful for him. And I feel even worse that I can’t show it.
“Okay, Donovan!” Rosa chirps. “This is how it works. You—what’s your name?” And then, of course, she points right at me.
“Rune,” I say, a familiar, encroaching sense of doom creeping over me.
“Super groovy,” Rosa says, beaming with delight. “Okay, Donovan! Raise your left hand, reach across the circle, and take Rune’s.”
Donovan closes his eyes, as if he’s commending his soul to God. “Is that really necessary?”
“I understand you’re uncomfortable,” Rosa says, patting his shoulder. “That’s normal. But if you just let go and surrender to the process, it’ll transform you. You’ll see.”
“I’m not uncomfortable. I just think this is…” For once, his expression is completely transparent to me. I can see him sort through and discard total bullshit, a waste of time, the worst moment of my professional life before he settles on, “…not for me. No offense. I’ll just sit this one out and?—”
“Not happening, Frost,” Ethan calls from across the room, his grin matching Rosa’s. “This is exactly why you need to be here. Now come on. Go with the flow.”
Maybe Ethan’s the one I ought to be investigating. No one should be that happy all the time. And God knows you’d have to be low-key Satanic to organize one of these retreats. But what kind of criminal mastermind spends his days running a tech company in a tiny town, talking like a surfer boy and collecting Marvel bobbleheads?
Looking like he’d rather be getting a root canal, Donovan braces himself, reaches across the circle, and takes my hand in his. His skin is warm against mine, his thumb sliding against my palm and his fingers skating across my knuckles, as if they belong there.
I will myself not to feel anything. To have his hand in mine be nothing more than the touch of skin on skin. The instant our fingers touch, though, I know I’m kidding myself.
The electric sensation that prickled through me when I landed on top of him is back, but this time it’s much more intense. My whole body hums, as if I’ve plugged myself into an electrical socket. Goosebumps erupt on my bare arms. Desire coils in my belly, slipping eager and hungry through my veins.
I steal a glance at Donovan and suck in a startled breath. His lips are parted, his eyes hot. Gone is the Ice Man who wouldn’t so much as look in my direction. His hand tightens on mine, his grip convulsive, like he’s resisting the urge to pull me toward him. And God help me, even knowing what I do, I would let him.
The rest of the human knot activity is honest-to-God torture. I’ve never been so grateful for Donovan’s superior analytic skills, which piss me off on a regular basis but at least allow our group to untangle ourselves in record speed, beating the other group by a country mile. The moment we’re free of each other, I excuse myself and dash for the restroom, where I splash cold water on my crimson cheeks and stare in dismay at my dilated pupils. I look like a woman who’s just had the best sex of her life, not an employee who was just forced to engage in a cliched teambuilding exercise. And if I can see it, so can everyone else—including Donovan.
We break for lunch, which I eat with Georgia and Jill, trying my best not to glance in Donovan’s direction. Instead, I focus on trying to assess whether either of them could possibly have played a role in what happened to my family. But they’re just so…ordinary. It doesn’t seem possible. Georgia’s ten years older than me, with two kids and a husband who doesn’t pick up his dirty socks. Jill’s unabashedly single and spends her weekends singing karaoke. Neither one of them screams “notorious Blood Witch, destroyer of worlds.”
Maybe I was crazy, thinking I could figure this out. Maybe Ella’s premonition was wrong. Maybe…a thousand things.
Maybe our next activity is Profile Bingo.
“Okay, everyone!” Rosa hands each of us a neon Post-it, then claps her hands. “I want you to write down something about yourself that not a lot of people know. Then hand it to me. I’ll type it up on a Bingo-style grid, give each of you a copy, and you’ll walk around the room and talk to everyone, matching them with their little secret. When you’re done, you’ll hand your sheets in to me. Sound good?”
I’ve changed my mind. Rosa is the villain I’ve been searching for, in perky, shiny disguise. Because somehow, I find myself scribbling “likes pineapple pizza” on a piece of paper and handing it to her, along with eleven other poor souls who have fallen under her spell. She collects all of our little slips, humming and chuckling to herself as she reads them, then types them up, prints them out, and sets us free.
Jill, I discover, is obsessed with Red Vines and the Shrek franchise. Jack, who works in HR, orders Mallomars in bulk from Amazon. Catelyn, a redhead in the sales department, designs her own board games. Gia, who’s been with the company from the very beginning, was once kissed by John Travolta. Ellen, Ethan’s assistant, has visited forty-seven countries. Thatcher, who works in R&D, can say “hold my beer” in six languages.
None of these people seem like uber-villains, or even remotely nefarious. Some of them even make me laugh. But the whole time I’m talking with them, I can’t help but be aware of the six-foot-two data engineer who’s leaning against the wall, glowering at the room at large, ignoring the rules of Profile Bingo. He waits for people to come to him, and when they do, they always wander off looking rattled. After one such encounter, Georgia leans into me and whispers, “I can’t decide if he’s hot, or just…terrifying.”
I consider avoiding Donovan altogether. But Rosa’s patrolling the room like a prison guard searching for infractions and contraband, and finally I have no choice. “Here,” I say, thrusting my sheet toward him. “X out your thing.”
He looks down at the only free box left. In bold, black Times New Roman 14-point font, it reads, “I don’t like liars.” Which, clearly, is a message meant for me.
“You know,” I say, shoving a pen into his hand, “if you were actually speaking to me, you could have conveyed this aloud, rather than scaring everyone here. And then I would have told you that I haven’t lied about anything.”
Donovan Xes through his Profile Bingo box with so much force, he tears through the paper. “Right. Like your mystical curse. And your relationship with my brother, who I saw you holding hands with. Is that what you want me to talk about, Rune?”
Tears sting my eyes. “I?—”
“Or maybe you want to talk about what happened on the sidewalk. Or when that sadistic cheerleader made us touch, before. You want to talk about that? Because I sure as shit don’t.” He pushes the paper back into my hands, his jaw a hard line.
The tears overflow, spilling down my cheeks. “Donovan, please.”
He shakes his head, his gaze ice-cold. “I don’t know what your game is, but whatever it is, I don’t want to play. Go back to Cooper and tell him that, why don’t you? Tell him he wins. I’m out. And for the rest of the time we’re here…stay away from me.”
He stalks off before I can say a word, his Profile Bingo page crumpled in his hand.