Chapter 18
Karia
Moonlight streams in through the gauzy curtains our second night at Dreary Inn, illuminating the top of Sullen’s head, his hands in the pocket of his hoodie, gaze focused through the sliver of fabric revealing the window pane and the courtyard beyond.
I wanted to go down to it this morning when I woke, maybe grab Sullen’s bare hand and lead him there through the maze of plants and trees and cobblestone walkways. Take advantage of the free breakfast Dreary promised when we checked in. It was a beautiful romantic fantasy inside my head.
But I woke up alone.
My last memory was huddling against Sullen’s back.
I thought he might turn to me, since he demanded I come to him, after all.
But he didn’t, and as I pressed my cheek tentatively to his spine, I realized he was sleeping, his breaths even and the tension nearly lost from his body.
Not completely, though. I do not think he knows yet how to sleep with full ease.
He was in the shower this morning, and he barely looked at me when he came out fully dressed, black gloves with green stitching back over his hands, white bandana around his throat.
I took a shower alone, feeling his eyes on me as I closed the bathroom door between us, but he didn’t call out to me.
When I saw in the mirror the deep purple and yellow bruises along my left side, over my shoulder and my arm, I wanted him to see it, too. To know what I would do for him.
But I said nothing and let the water sting the ache away, from battering my body against the dungeon door, trying to get to him.
A tray was brought to our door, set atop a silver cart with rolling wheels. Pancakes and fruit and bacon and a carafe of coffee presented without our asking. Sullen ate as if he never had in his life, half-sitting on the cherry oak desk pressed against the opposite wall of our room.
I occupied one of two chairs cloistered around a small table by the window, where Sullen stands now.
He said nothing to me as I sipped coffee, but when I didn’t eat from the half of the food he set in front of me, I felt his gaze on mine. When I looked up, he nodded toward the tray, his own mouth full, no words leaving his lips.
I picked at the fruit and ate an entire pancake smeared with butter.
It was good, but the worries gnawing at me stole the joy from any of it.
“Did you learn anything?” I ask now, in the quiet dark as I sit on the end of the bed dressed in a black shirt and black sleep shorts, my hair braided over one shoulder.
Another thing I did to stave off the boredom.
He left me after he ate, informing me in a stiff manner he was going to Sanford’s room. He told me to keep the knife out—it’s on the desk now—but that he would prop Sanford’s door open so he could listen for me.
I know he did it, too.
I looked through the peephole at the room across the hall, one down.
The door was wide open.
My heart fluttered then, when I saw it.
But I spent the rest of the day pacing, drawing at the desk on a Dreary Inn notepad, more than a few times looping mine and Sullen’s names together in cursive. I balled those up and threw them away in the golden trashcan beneath the desk.
Lunch arrived at my door.
Then dinner.
I ate little, pushed the cart back out into the hall, tried to listen in on whatever Sanford and Sullen were spending hours discussing, but all I heard was strange silence.
Sullen doesn’t look at me. His hood is pushed back, revealing the soft curve of his ears, the haphazardness of his haircut.
He is so tall, his back broad, even the hoodie doesn’t hide the muscular build of his shoulders and his gray, fitted joggers he must have stolen from the Emporium cling to the roundness of his ass.
I bite the inside of my cheek and look away, wondering if Sanford told Sullen about whatever came of his introduction to the pretty employee last night.
But thinking of Sullen discussing something like that feels off. He doesn’t like small talk. Today, it seems, he doesn’t like to talk at all. At least, not to me.
“How do you feel?” I try again, attempting to coax something from him. I keep in mind he was stabbed, locked away, that he defended me physically, would have probably died for me underneath that grimy hotel.
But I want to know something. Anything.
Like when we’re leaving. Where we’re going. What Sanford said to him.
What if his grandfather turned him against me?
My cheeks heat, my body soon after, thinking perhaps after all I’ve done, he won’t choose me like I’ve chosen him.
“What did you eat for lunch?” There is an edge to my voice.
I tighten my arms around my shins, my knees to my chest as I shift on the king bed, golden sheets beneath me.
My spine is straight despite the ball I’m shaped into, and I look down my nose at his stubborn back across the room, my position and the lamp from my side of the bed too dim to illuminate details like the view from the window, the courtyard I didn’t get to dine with him at.
I could have gone myself, and part of me wanted to, just to prove he doesn’t have me on a leash.
But I was partly afraid to be far from him, and partly… I’m not so sure I’m not tethered to him.
I think of my father holding me, preventing me from getting to him as the guards took him away, severing our bond.
Fear. That’s what I felt then. Fear and anger. It was only two days ago, and yet it seems so much further away, despite the fact I can feel the freshness of emotions as if it happened a minute prior to this one.
I was terrified to lose you. I was out of my mind, thinking of you hurt worse. Then you were. Sanford was right. I didn’t stop anything. Not then, not now.
“Sullen!” I snap his name and his shoulders tense, his shadow splayed along the wall.
Slowly, he turns toward me without pivoting his entire body. His dark gaze meets mine and I see the cut on his cheek from Stein as I wonder if it’ll leave a scar.
He says nothing, and I notice his complexion is still so pale. Lighter even than his usual pallor.
“Tell me what you’re thinking.” It comes out like I’m begging and I loathe that, but for him… I know I will do it again.
His lips part, plush and full, then his gaze drops and I look down too, wondering what he sees.
My nipples are tight points beneath my shirt, the hotel room frigid, but my knees are pulled to my chest and I know he can’t see that.
The sleeves are halfway down my arms, too, hiding the bruises from when I tried to get to him.
My sleep shorts sit high on my thighs though, and I’m not wearing underwear beneath.
I changed before he even came into the room, maybe ten minutes ago.
I don’t think he can truly see anything with my knees together the way they are, but I feel heat along my chest all the same as his eyes slowly lift to mine.
“I imagine you don’t really want to know,” he says softly, staring right at me.
“If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have asked.”
“Oh, but you would. You can’t stand the silence. Just like you could never be alone, when we were younger.”
I lift my brows, indignation filling my bones. “Excuse me?”
A cold smile pulls on the corner of his pretty mouth. “I don’t think you need me to repeat it.”
“Just because you spent your entire life trapped inside your room doesn’t mean we all had to do the same, Sullen.” I narrow my gaze, wanting to fight. I know what I said wasn’t fair, but if it’s the only way he’ll engage, then fine. I can be the world’s biggest brat if he’d like.
He doesn’t say anything for a moment. His expression doesn’t change. He is calm and steady and silent and I wonder if I’ve pushed him away instead of dragging him into an argument I’m dying to have. After all we’ve been through, the fact he won’t open up to me hurts.
But then he turns fully and I notice the flash of silver around his neck. Think of him cutting Cosmo with the same weapon his father used to cut him. We’ve come so far from that very first night, even though it’s only been days. Yet he still can’t let down a single wall for me.
“Of course not,” he says softly, watching me like I’m prey and he can’t wait to lunge.
I want you to. Attack me, Sullen. I’m waiting for it. I won’t even fight back unless you demand it.
“You couldn’t stay in your little castle if it meant not being railed by your friends, could you?
” There is no menace in his words, and it makes them worse.
“You couldn’t stand not being the center of attention everywhere you went.
We’re both only children, no siblings to speak of, but you embody all the stereotypes.
Yet your parents didn’t coddle you enough, did they?
All the money didn’t buy what you most wanted.
The dirty little princess, so very desperate for love, she’d go anywhere, do anything, play second to Von’s true attentions, if only she could feel something, usually some undeserving boy’s cock inside of her—”
“What happened today?” I snarl, my face hot.
“With your grandpa? What happened, Sullen? Because yesterday I risked my life for you, I almost got hit by your father for you,” here, his eyes narrow, dark brown arrows of rage, “and tonight you want to slut shame? Throw the past in my face? When will I have proven myself worthy of you? When is it enough? Did you want Stein to hurt me? Did you want me to die for you? Only then you’d remember me with some fondness, when I was a martyr for you, like your mother?
Is that it? Mommy issues? I can be your mommy if you want, Sullen, I just thought you liked to be in control.
You know, strapping me down to a dental chair kind of gave me that impression but maybe I was wrong so clear it up for me. ”
He says nothing as my chest heaves, more words winding up on the tip of my tongue. But I want him to say something. Fight back. Be nasty and mean if that’s what he needs. God knows it feels like I need it.