CHAPTER 22 #2
“It’s just a friendly cuddle, Bambi,” he said, slipping the hand beneath my shirt to rest on my lower back. “I won’t try to cop a feel. Promise.”
Except that I’d never cuddled with a male that wasn’t a family member before.
This position might seem innocent to Riku, but I was more than aware of his body intimately pressed to mine.
His hand on my back started to move, tracing circles that felt oddly comforting instead of sensual.
I let him do it, surprised when the skin contact along with his steady warmth relaxed my tense muscles.
In no time, my eyes drooped, and I began to drift off.
What only felt like seconds later, I heard the main door to the dorm click open.
I jerked upright in a flash, scrambling to disentangle myself from Riku as if we’d been caught doing something naughty.
A chuckle rumbled from him, and I smacked his chest in irritation before managing to lurch off the couch and face the door.
When I found Thorne frozen in the doorway, staring at us like he’d seen a ghost, heat crept up my neck and into my face.
“Don’t worry, man,” Riku drawled, dropping his legs to the floor so he could sit up. “I wasn’t making a move on your precious Snowflake. Her virginity is still intact.”
What the—? How did he know? Had Thorne told him?
I whirled on Riku, utter mortification making me snap, “Why do you assume I’m a virgin?”
“Oh, Bambi,” he replied, a teasing grin lifting his mouth as he looked up at me. “It’s as plain as the cute little button nose on your face. You might as well have a blinking neon sign on your face that says ‘I’m a virgin.’”
My jaw dropped. Could he really tell just by looking at me? Feeling way too exposed, I scowled and snapped again, “Did you just compare me to Rudolph this time?”
His grin widened.
“Who’s Rudolph?” a new voice said, and my humiliation deepened even more.
“Bambi is,” Riku replied to Oz, who was now in the doorway as well.
“Wait, Bambi is Rudolph? I don’t get it.”
“It’s simple. Both deer are innocent little virgins, and so is she.”
I threw up my hands with a groan, then turned for the door. Refusing to look at Thorne’s face again, I focused on Oz as I walked across the room and said, “Thanks for getting me my stuff, Oz, but I really can’t stay here. I know it’s past midnight, but I’d rather be punished than—”
“Why do you think I want to kill you?”
At Thorne’s softly spoken words, I stopped dead. Still looking at Oz, I saw his eyes widen, then flick behind me to Riku. Wow. Okay. So he wanted to do this right here and now, in front of Riku and Oz, no less.
Except that his two friends suddenly moved as if in response to some unspoken cue.
When they quietly left the main room and headed for their own, Comet lifted off the couch and followed after them.
As their doors clicked shut, Thorne silently closed the door behind him and leaned against it, crossing his arms over his chest. A wall.
A barrier. Keeping me trapped inside so I couldn’t run or hide from his question.
Seconds dragged by. Minutes.
“Answer me, Snowflake.”
His quiet tone, completely devoid of anger, cracked apart the last of my resistance.
“Because you told me you wanted to,” I said, unable to hide the tremor in my voice.
Still not looking at him, it was the shift in his tone that gave away his shock. “When?”
I savagely bit my lip before forcing myself to say, “That day. The day my world fell apart. I tried to tell you what happened, but . . . but you were so angry and filled with . . . with hatred and rage. The sky darkened, and a storm blew in. Rain started pounding on our heads, and lightning forked through the sky. You were the storm in that moment, just like you were during your demonstration in my Conjuring class. You were covered in blue sparking electricity, the air heavy with so much deadly current that I knew you were about to strike me dead.”
Struggling to breathe, I pressed a shaking hand to my chest before continuing, “‘I’ll kill you,’ you told me.
Screamed at me. I could see in your glowing eyes how much you meant it.
And I was terrified, so terrified that I .
. . I ran. I ran and hid like a coward. Instead of facing your righteous wrath, the punishment that I deserved, I used a portal to escape.
And I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t let you kill me then, and I’m sorry you can’t kill me now.
I didn’t plan on this. I didn’t plan on any of this.
Being admitted to Heartstone, getting partnered with you.
I know you hate being stuck with me, and I don’t blame you.
I don’t even blame you for wanting to kill me. We both know I deserve it.”
He didn’t say anything for a long time. The only sounds in the room were my frantically beating heart and unsteady breaths.
Now that I’d reminded him of his promise, that old fear crowded in once more.
Fear that he was about to exact his revenge on me for taking his sister’s life.
He deserved to. I’d always known that right belonged to him.
But as the seconds ticked by, I suddenly didn’t want him to.
The feeling grew and grew, until every molecule of my being wanted to fall down at his feet and beg him not to end me.
Before I could, before I could utter a single word, he finally replied, “I never said that I would kill you.”
My eyes snapped to his. “What?”
“I never said that I would kill you,” he repeated, carefully enunciating each word. “It seems to me like there are many things about that day you can’t remember. I was angry, yes. I called down a storm, yes. But I never said those words to you.”
Feeling like my world was turning upside down, I shook my head, certain he was the one who didn’t remember things correctly. “But our pactum. You didn’t want to bind yourself to me because then you wouldn’t be able to kill me.”
“I didn’t want to bind myself to you because every time I’m near you, I’m reminded of her,” he shot back.
Not in anger, but . . . but in pain. Raw pain.
“I was finally in control of my life again until you came back into it, forcing me to reopen scars and relive old memories. But I never once said that I would kill you, Snowflake, and I don’t want you to ever talk about deserving to die again.
I need you alive. Alive. Do you understand me? ”
Eyes wide, my heart in my throat, I weakly whispered, “I understand.”
“Good,” he said, lifting a hand to jerk it through his hair, revealing just how upset he was. After another long moment, he said in a much quieter tone, “You’re sleeping here tonight in my bedroom. No arguments.”
Panic rushed through me.
Before I could protest, he added, “I’ll be on the couch. Text if you need anything.”
With that, he pushed off the door and headed for the kitchen, our conversation officially over.
Still reeling from what I’d confessed to him and what he’d confessed to me, I continued to watch him.
Did he really not want to kill me? Had I made up those words in my mind that day, so certain that he wanted to? That I deserved it?
Overwhelmed with uncertainty, too confused and drained to sort it all out, I silently turned away. Not toward the exit but toward the hall that would lead me to his bedroom, to the place I swore to myself I would never return.