Chapter 15 Volatile Compounds #3
Back at the house, I catch up with Emily and spend most of the evening in her room, sprawled across her bed while she meticulously paints her nails the same pale lavender as her phone case.
She doesn’t say much at first, just hums along to a playlist of moody girl pop and occasionally randomly asks if I want tea or one of those weird collagen gummies she’s obsessed with.
I accept both, mostly to keep her from looking too closely at me and noticing how off-kilter I still feel from earlier.
Eventually, the conversation drifts into family territory.
Emily casually drops that her distant cousin’s wedding was cancelled because the groom got caught sexting someone from the family’s equestrian staff.
The bride’s mother is threatening to sue for emotional damages.
She says it with the same tone most people reserve for recapping a soap opera.
Then she veers into a breathless tangent about how the family is “rebranding” and how one of her aunts (Nora) is convinced that wearing only beige attracts wealth.
She tells me a fact she saw on online that stops me cold: apparently, lobsters taste with their feet.
Also, she adds, squirrels can’t burp, male octopuses die right after mating, and there are people on the internet who think birds are secretly drones built by the government.
I stare at her, unsure how we got from familial disgrace to all that, but it’s Emily, so I don’t question it because I’m just glad to be chatting with her without so much heaviness again.
There is still an undercurrent of sadness about her, but she’s trying.
I let her talk, her words washing over me.
I chime in when I think she expects a response and let the lull stretch between us when she doesn’t.
She doesn’t press for anything—just lays next to me and rambles, like being close to me might help anchor her to something normal, which I am grateful for, because my mind is a million miles away.
I find out Baryn is still away on his trip, thank god. Emily mentions it in passing, saying something about him “networking with people who own too many vacation homes,” and I don’t ask for more.
The evening goes by in a blur of tea, nail polish fumes, and a half-watched movie we never finish. And before I know it, we’re both yawning.
Which leaves Theo and me approximately no time at all to compile everything we found and hash it out evidence-board style.
I remind myself I’m here for Emily—despite the fact that the other reasons I’m here are technically for her, too—and that tomorrow is a new day.
I traipse back to our bedroom and push open the door, expecting to find Theo in the dark snoring. Instead, I walk straight into a full frontal ambush.
Theo. Shirtless.
Backlit by the soft glow of lamplight, which silhouettes every defined line of his body like a living sculpture in a museum, I suddenly want to spend hours studying.
Toned, taut skin stretched over lean muscle, the slope of his strong back shifting as he moves, and—Jesus Christ—pants halfway pulled on, revealing what I can only describe as a biblical event happening below the belt.
Like, stop-the-presses, change-the-course-of-history level of significance.
And when I say I clock the size of the situation, I mean I actually stop breathing. Fully, completely. My lungs just give up.
There’s a short circuit in my brain. Static. Blank screen. Reboot failed. All major systems offline.
That’s what it looks like soft?
There is no recovering from this. Not quickly. Not gracefully.
“Oh my god,” I blurt, because clearly I lack the emotional maturity to handle this situation with dignity. “Do you have to declare that thing at airport security or…?”
I don’t know why this is what comes out of my mouth, but I can’t stop it. It launches out of me like a reflex, a panicked word-vomit born of thirst for this man and poor impulse control.
Theo jolts like I zapped him with a cattle prod, yanking his pants up with comical urgency, wide eyes locking onto mine like I just caught him committing a federal offense (one that I wasn’t in on too).
A flush creeps into his cheeks, blooming pink and obvious and utterly delightful.
He actually blushes.
Which only makes me want to see it again. For science.
The blush, you perv.
Definitely the blush.
“If you ever get tired of lecturing,” I add, finally stepping fully into the room and tossing my sweater on the chair like I didn’t just have a complete systems crash, “you could definitely model for anatomy textbooks. Possibly even some advanced-level sculpture classes.”
He runs a hand through his hair. “You weren’t supposed to be back yet.”
“And yet,” I say, waving vaguely in the air between us, “here we are. Me. You. And…him.”
He grabs a T-shirt from the bed. I point at him before he can put it on. “Okay but seriously. Do you give out warning notices before dating someone? Like a little laminated card that says ‘may cause speechlessness and difficulty walking the next day?’”
He holds the shirt like a shield, then lowers it like he’s reconsidering. The flush climbs higher.
“I don’t date,” he says quickly. “And you seem to have a lot to say about it,” he adds, eying me.
“Right.” I nod slowly. “Suddenly, all your quiet confidence makes a lot more sense. That is not the energy of a man uncertain about anything.”
He looks at me like he doesn’t know whether to be flattered or hide under the bed.
I kind of want to hide under the bed now too.
Maybe we can hide under there together.
This is great. Fantastic. Now that I’ve seen that, how am I supposed to concentrate on literally anything else ever again?
Lila: I just saw Theo naked(ish) and I am UNWELL.
Calla: Define naked(ish). Are we talking top half? Bottom half? Full Greek statue situation?
Serena: Was it a medical emergency? A hot professor striptease? I need context.
Lila: Pants were mid-calf. Dong was mid-thigh.
Lila: Soft.
Lila: SOFT.
Calla: Shut. Up. You saw the preview and it was already IMAX???
Serena: I can’t spiritually handle this.
Lila: He BLUSHED. And now I’m blushing.
Lila: And also feral?
Lila: And panicking??
Lila: Like I cannot do this. I can’t want this. This is so bad.
Calla: Help is not coming. You’re on your own in that trench of thirst.
Serena: My only advice is hydrate, stretch, and make sure your last will and testament is up to date.
Lila: I mean… I’m not even mad if it kills me? But I also need to not be thinking about this. About him LIKE this.
Lila: Ugh.
Calla: Death by D. You’d make a beautiful cautionary tale.
Serena: Put it on your tombstone. Here lies Lila: overcome by the sheer brute force of Theo’s third leg.
Lila: Honestly? Worth it.
Lila: But also… no. I cannot go there. I won’t.
Lila: I think.