Chapter 16 Shadows and Steam #2
The scream was still lodged somewhere in my throat when instinct took over.
My body reacting before my mind had any chance of catching up, as I stumbled backward straight into the stream of water.
The sudden heat hitting my skin just as sharply as the shock itself.
My foot slipped slightly, my hand shooting out to steady myself against the tiled wall as my other arm came up across my chest in a futile attempt at modesty.
Which only made things worse when the water soaked through the strands of hair clinging to my face and promptly sent a stinging line of shampoo directly into my eyes.
“Ah!” I hissed, squeezing them shut as I blindly reached for anything that might help, which, unfortunately, was not helpful at all when the only thing within reach was more water.
“Oh, for the love of…” Bo started, his voice pitched somewhere between exasperation and disbelief.
Though I barely caught the rest of it over the rush of water, I felt the slap of a hand towel hit my face.
I cried out again at the shock, then used it to wipe the shampoo from my eyes, trying to relieve the sting.
I turned away from him entirely, fumbling for the handle and yanking the door shut between us.
“Give me a second!” I snapped, scrubbing hastily at my eyes as I ducked my head under the stream, rinsing the last of the shampoo from my hair. Now doing so in a rush that was far from graceful but entirely necessary, seeing as I wasn’t as alone as I would have liked.
It also took longer than I would have liked before I could finally see again, blinking rapidly as I dragged my hair back from my face. Then I reached for the door once more, opening it just enough to poke my hand out, palm up in expectation.
“Towel,” I said shortly.
“Okay, but remember to leave the water running, so it interrupts the wards,” Bo instructed.
“Yeah, I remember,” I grumbled, holding out my arm, and after a brief pause, one was tossed toward me.
It landed against my arm in a way that suggested he had absolutely no intention of making this any easier than it needed to be.
I caught it quickly, wrapping it tightly around myself before stepping out.
The warmth of the bathroom did very little to offset the very real awareness of just how exposed I still felt.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded immediately, not even bothering to soften the question as I reached for another towel and began rubbing it briskly through my hair. My gaze flicked toward him despite myself.
“I told you the bathroom was…” he began.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I cut in quickly, waving him off with a distracted motion as I focused on drying my hair, though the tension in my voice gave away far more than I intended.
“After he trapped you in that cage, I figured showing up again might be too risky.”
“Thanks to you, I got out,” he replied, his tone sharpening slightly, though there was something else beneath it. Something that made me pause just for a second.
My gaze flicked toward the door, toward the space beyond it, my grip tightening slightly on the towel in my hands.
“Are you sure it’s safe?” I asked, quieter now, the question slipping out before I could stop it.
“Safe enough,” he said, though the answer wasn’t entirely reassuring. His eyes flicked briefly toward the same door before returning to me.
“I created a diversion. Something I knew would pull Lord Oblivion away.” Something in my chest twisted at that, the words settling in a way I hadn’t expected.
Because the idea of Wye being deliberately pulled away, manipulated into leaving, didn’t sit quite right anymore.
Not after everything that had changed between us.
Not after last night.
I shifted slightly, the towel loosening just enough that I had to catch it quickly. Then I pulled it tighter around myself, only vaguely aware of the way Bo’s gaze flicked downward for a fraction of a second before he looked away again.
“Next time, you might want to try knocking first,” I muttered, adjusting the towel with a small frown.
“Oh, please,” he scoffed, the corner of his mouth twitching slightly despite the tension still lingering in the room.
“Like I haven’t seen mortal… squishy bits before,” he said, waving a hand up and down to indicate my body.
“Oi,” I snapped immediately, glancing down at myself and now fixating on my own squishy bits, my face turning red, knowing how many of them Wye had seen this morning.
“Rude much,” I grumbled.
I finished dragging the towel through my hair before letting it fall around my shoulders.
My fingers tightened slightly in the fabric wrapped around me as the silence between us stretched just a fraction too long.
Because now that the shock had worn off enough for my thoughts to catch up, something else began to take its place.
Awareness of why he was here, or should I say, of what that might mean.
“You shouldn’t be here,” I said finally, my voice quieter now, though no less certain as I looked at him properly.
“If he finds you…”
“He won’t,” Bo cut in, though there was no arrogance in it, just a kind of certainty that felt earned rather than assumed. His gaze flicked briefly toward the door before returning to me, his expression tightening slightly.
“Not if we leave now.”
The words landed harder than they should have.
Not if we leave.
A small frown pulled at my brows as I straightened slightly, my grip on the towel tightening without me realizing it.
“Leave?” I repeated, the word slow, uncertain, like I wasn’t quite sure I’d heard him properly.
“I’m not…” I hesitated, the rest of the sentence catching somewhere between instinct and something else I wasn’t ready to name.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
His expression didn’t change immediately, though something in his eyes did. As if he knew the real reason I didn’t want to leave and why I had now changed my tune.
“You don’t understand what you’re dealing with,” he said, his voice lower now, though the urgency beneath it hadn’t gone anywhere.
“He’s not who you think he is, Eliza,” he said, speaking my name for once as if it would help in getting through to me. Something in my chest tightened at that.
“I know exactly who he is,” I replied, a little too quickly, because the idea of Bo standing there, in this room, telling me otherwise, didn’t sit right with me. Not after everything I had seen. Everything I had felt.
Bo’s jaw shifted slightly, like he was biting back whatever his first response might have been. His gaze dragged over me for a moment before settling again.
“No,” he said quietly, though there was nothing uncertain about it.
“You only know what he’s shown you.”
The words sank in deeper than I wanted them to. So, I shook my head slightly, more to push away the thought than anything else.
“I can talk to him,” I said, the idea forming as I spoke it, even if I hadn’t fully thought it through yet.
“I can fix this. He doesn’t have to see you as a threat. I can make him understand, get him to let you stay.” Bo let out a slow breath at that, not quite a sigh, though it carried the same weight.
“It doesn’t work like that,” he said, his voice steady, but there was something else there now. Something closer to concern.
“You think he’s going to listen when it matters? When it’s you on the line?” That gave me pause, and just enough for doubt to slip in where I didn’t want it.
“What is that supposed to mean?” I asked, quieter now, though the tension in my voice hadn’t eased. He held my gaze for a second longer than necessary, like he was weighing how much to say. How far to push before I shut down completely.
“It means that the second he realizes you’re not what he thinks you are… everything changes,” he said slowly, carefully, and my breath caught slightly at that, my heart hammering in my chest.
“What do you mean, what he thinks I am?” I asked, the question slipping out before I could stop it.
But Bo didn’t answer straight away.
And somehow… That was worse.
Or at least I thought it was.
But I was wrong. And evidently, so was Wye.
I knew that when Bo told me,
“You’re not his Siren, and I can prove it.”