Chapter Twenty-seven
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Farewell, my innocence.
Azalea
Malcolm loves me in a way I can’t actually comprehend. It keeps hitting me, when I least expect it. It steals my breath and quiets my brain and leaves me stunned.
Oh so casually, he just notes how, yeah, if you don’t want kids, I’ll have surgery. Or wow, you actually do want to be intimate someday? That’s wild. I was totally prepared to just never worry about what society and everyone in the entire world says men can’t stop thinking about.
Or, I don’t know, how about I assess right now. With me seated in his theater. On a Monday night. After a weekend spent talking and laughing and doing nothing more than playing dating sims together.
Slathered across the screen before me are a collection of images from the sims we played over the weekend, and I guess this presentation is why Mr. Malcolm Swallow told me earlier he was heading home from work first.
“So.” Standing before the presentation, he laser pointers at the first image, the tamest in the bunch, and I do dearly wonder if he’ll show me whatever presentations went into his previous schemes concerning hiring me as an assassin.
“Don’t be fooled by the supposed progression in these images.
Each of these pictures isn’t a single lesson.
You’ve already endured a few of them, so the goal will be to make it through all of them in a single session without your brain running away with you. ”
I blink, glancing at the great grand number of them all.
Forehead kisses. Cheek kisses. Neck… Shoulder… Back…
I gulp.
He settles the laser pointer remote against his other hand. “I know it might look a bit overwhelming, but—trust me—the next slide is worse.”
My breath stutters. “Am I ready to see such a thing?”
Solemn, his head shakes. “No.”
Phew.
He turns, presses a button, and the screen changes. “But I’m going to show you anyway.”
Squeaking, I cover my eyes.
“Dove, do you want this or not?” he chides.
Whimpering, I part my fingers and witness a white screen populated by a single, bold word.
SIKE
Losing the tension in my shoulders, I drop my hands. “You’re actually the worst,” I say.
Smug, he smirks. “Thank you. I know.” Settling into the chair beside me, he murmurs, “So. Thoughts?”
Most of my thoughts aren’t productive. They’re timid and shy and on the verge of tumbling down a spiral that will insist death waits for us unless I manage to do all of this romance correctly. So, I deflect and say, “I want to see your other plot presentations.”
“You’re dreadfully unfocused on the matter at hand.”
“It’s not at hand, though, is it? I still haven’t reached this semester yet, so there’s plenty of time to show me the mentally unwell collage you used to outline your plan to hire me as a fake assassin.”
Holding my attention, he presses a button on the laser pointer remote, and the screen changes to display Gru, from Despicable Me, standing in front of his presentation board on a four-squared grid.
In the first square, the board says, Keep Azalea late at work.
In the second, Send paid actor Anthony to recruit Azalea and frighten her back to my loving arms.
In the third, Watch Azalea agree to murder me.
In the fourth, Gru looks back at the text, stricken. And Malcolm’s laser pointer circles the expression. “This is how I felt that night, by the way.”
“You seriously prepped this?”
“I assumed one of the first things on your mind when you saw my presentation tonight would be more please. So, yes. I did.”
“Huh.” I eye him.
He eyes me back.
My heart pitters a slight bit faster.
He smiles. “I love when you look in love with me.”
I fidget, reaching into my pocket to meddle with my crystal heart. “I take it you don’t actually have layouts of your previous schemes?”
“Nah, I worked alone. No reason to leave a paper trail.” He crosses his legs. “I can’t help but notice you’re avoiding discussing the relevant topic.”
Taking a deep breath, I fortify myself. Then I spill the truth that’s been bothering me ever since I mentioned an interest in partaking of romantic activities. “I’d like to kiss you in my blue dress at the Flag Day ball.”
He goes still. “That’s rather soon.”
“No tongue.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it. Well.” He pauses. “Would dream of it. Wouldn’t dare.”
“I’m not hoping to enjoy it. I’d simply like to not throw up. I think that’s a reasonable first step in the right direction.” And the surrounding exuberance of the magical setting we’ve spent weeks crafting makes me think that I might just survive it, too.
Malcolm doesn’t submit. “I think the point of taking actually reasonable first steps is so that when we reach the one where we do kiss, throwing up isn’t a risk at all.”
I tuck myself in against the white sheet that protects me, mentally, from sitting here and mutter, “I never took you for one so full of blind optimism before.”
“Really? And here I thought that was all I’m known for.”
“You’re actually known for making grown men cry, regularly.”
His smile fades. “Still? I haven’t done that for at least a month.”
“You must miss it,” I croon.
“I prefer your tears, dove. I long to taste them straight from your skin.”
My heart trembles.
“Would you let me?”
Breathless, I say, “I don’t know if I’m ready for that module yet…but…maybe. Someday.”
Leaning in, inches from my face, he murmurs, “So…someday you still think I’ll be making you cry?”
“Won’t you?” I ask.
He smiles, and it’s beautiful, charming, and wicked. Gentle, he draws a finger down my cheek and says, “Only on purpose.”
It shouldn’t, but that makes me blush.
“Dove…” he asks
“What?” I murmur.
“Would you like to try falling asleep in my arms tonight?”
I would. I really would. I’ve spent the past few days waking up in them, so what’s the difference, right?
I’ve survived. Nothing bad has happened.
I should be able to do it. And if I have less than a month until I want to have my first kiss, advancing in the efforts that don’t involve my mouth makes sense.
The way I am is stupid, anyway. All my dumb rules are based in ancient trauma. I can overcome them. I need to. I want to.
“You don’t have to,” Malcolm says, and his nearness, his touch, his smile remain unchanged. “You know that, don’t you?”
I blink, and my eyes water.
He fixates on the building moisture, then whispers a swear. “I’ll love you no matter what.”
A tear slips free, and Malcolm watches it before he leans in. Soft as a butterfly’s wingbeat, he kisses it from my skin. His hum vibrates against my flesh as he murmurs, “This wasn’t on purpose, dove. I’m sorry. You okay?”
Throat tight, I say, “I’m okay.”
“Are they happy tears, then?” His palm slips from my face to rest at my throat.
“I don’t know.”
“Tell me what’s spinning in that precious mind of yours.”
My breath catches on an inhale. “I never imagined I’d ever be loved again after my parents died.
I think I forgot how safe it feels to know you aren’t…
” I crumple, hugging myself. “…alone.” My nails bite through my gloves, into my arms. “Somewhere along the way, I made being alone safer, but it’s…
really nice to have someone I can rely on.
Someone who doesn’t expect anything from me. Someone I can trust.”
“Even if that someone is a monster?”
“I might be warming up to the idea of your talons.”
“I promise I’ll dip them in rubbing alcohol before sinking them into you.”
Frail, I smile. “I appreciate that.”
Much too soon, his touch abandons me, and he rises. “Why don’t we just get ready for bed, and see where the night takes us, hm?”
My flesh prickles. “Are you going to attempt to seduce me?”
“Darling.” He peers down his straight nose at me, and his eyes glitter with evil. “Would I ever do something so heinous?”
The answer, of course, is yes, he would. So. After he heinously coaxes me close, I fall asleep listening to the sound of his heartbeat, and in the morning I once again discover that I have—against all odds—survived.