15. Blurring Lines
Blurring Lines
Elias
“Do you want me to kiss you?”
At my whispered question, Desdemona’s eyes flutter and then a blush blooms on her cheeks. She pushes me away, forcing me to give her space, and grabs my wrist, pulling my hand away from her face.
“We came here to plan what we need to do to convince everyone we’re together,” Desdemona snaps. “Not to discuss your unconventional philosophies.”
There’s a hint of anger in her voice, but her eyes are still wide and shiny, and the flush is still deep and dark on her cheeks, a damask rose burst open. If she found my words hard to swallow, it’s perhaps because she liked the taste a little too much.
Maybe that’s her problem. Maybe she doesn’t put enough things in her mouth she actually likes the taste of.
“You really think that’s what’s going to make us more convincing?” I jab my chin in the direction of her notebook, which is lying pitifully in a heap of rumpled pages on the smooth wooden parquet. “A schedule?”
“I like being organised.”
“You like being in control.”
“Everybody does.” She glares at me. “If you have a better solution, I’m yet to hear it.”
“I do have a better solution.” I sink back down into the chair so that I’m back beneath her eye level, and I can practically see the sigh of relief that seeps out of her chest. “It’s definitely going to work, but it’s going to require you trusting me.”
She sighs. “Why do I feel like you’re about to propose something absolutely despicable?”
“Because you think I’m some sleazy evil mastermind,” I tell her, smirking. “You give me far too much credit, if anything.”
She hesitates, and I wonder if my words hit their mark.
“What are you proposing, then?” she asks finally. Her knuckles, where she’s holding onto the edge of the desk, have gone white with tension. She’s dreading this. Good.
“I want to get to know you,” I tell her.
She blinks, staring down at me for a long moment without uttering a word.
I wave a hand. “Nothing despicable about that, is there? I just want to know more about you.”
I told you about the article, didn’t I?
But I don’t need to say that out loud, because something tells me Desdemona remembers that very well already.
“Alright—fine. Yes, let’s do it.” She licks her lips and glances at her notebook on the floor. “When should we…”
If she says the word “schedule” one more time, I might genuinely lose my fucking mind.
“Now.”
“Here?”
I tilt my head. “You’d prefer my bedroom?”
She hesitates, except this time, her pearl-white teeth dig into her bottom lip, a tiny, involuntary movement.
Oh.
I sit up in my chair, eyebrows lifting, a sparking scattering up my spine like a lit fuse.
“Would you?”
“Of course not.”
Yes, you would, I think, and I suddenly remember her in the library, her back to the bookshelves, her fingers curled around the lapel of my blazer. Her eyes dropping to my mouth like she was looking for a kiss. The first moment between us that ever felt like the lines blurring.
I should’ve kissed you.
Maybe I would’ve, if her idiot brothers hadn’t interrupted us.
“My study is fine,” she adds after another moment of hesitation. “Alright, yes. Now. Why not?” She pushes her hair back from her shoulder, then folds her hands on her crossed legs. “How would you like to start?”
“Tell me your favourite colour.”
“Are we five-year-olds? Why would—”
“It’s a simple question. It requires only a simple answer.”
She narrows her eyes. “Don’t patronise me.”
“Let me guess, then.” I tap my chin with a finger, gazing at her. “Your tastes are so fucking dull. I bet it’s not even a colour. Black—no, white.”
It’s her turn to smirk. “It’s blue.”
An unexpected flutter catches my heart.
“Really?” I quickly smooth over my own surprise. “I mean, what kind? Dark blue, or—”
“Blue like the summer sky.”
“How cute. Very sweet. And what—”
She cuts me off. “What’s yours?”
Blue, I think. Blue, just like yours, just like that stupid ribbon in your hair. The deep, brilliant blue of distant star fields, the astral blue of nebulae, the blue that makes me think of being so fucking far away that my life shrinks into a microscopic, insignificant dot.
“Black,” I tell her.
She scoffs. “Whose tastes are dull now?”
“Still you. I like the colour black,” I tell her. “You dated Julian Langford.”
“And yet you’re the one who keeps bringing him up.”
I shrug. “What can I say. My intellectual curiosity is tickled.”
“He asked me out, and I said yes. We dated for a year, then broke up.”
“Is that why you went out with him?” I ask, watching her closely. “Just because he asked?”
She hesitates, and for a split second, her gaze drops out from under mine. When she meets my eyes again, there’s a tiny twist to her lips like a grimace.
“I don’t know why I went out with him, alright? He asked me, and I knew I’d need a boyfriend, and that he’d keep asking until I either said yes or dated someone else, so I thought saying yes would be killing two birds with one stone.”
“How efficient of you,” I murmur thoughtfully.
Desdemona’s eyes narrow, and a vein throbs in the pale column of her neck. She speaks in a poised tone, and her words are sharp as the pinprick of a needle.
“And I suppose you slept with Elodie Avigneux because you were deeply in love with her?”
I hold her gaze, which bores into mine like she’s trying to peer into my soul. Little to see there: my soul, as I imagine it, is what space would look like without stars to fill it. It’s dark and still and empty. Truly neutral.
“Just a small favour to a good friend,” I say in amiable tones.
“Not worthless love, no?” she says.
“How many times did Julian make you come?”
“Maybe it’s Julian you should be dating,” she snaps. “Since you’re so fascinated with his sex life.”
“I’m asking about yours.”
“I didn’t keep count of my orgasms.”
“What about the first one?”
“I don’t remember.”
I sit back with a laugh. “Because it didn’t happen.”
“How would you know?” She shakes her head. “More importantly, why would you care?”
“Because, love, if you and I were really dating, your orgasms would be pretty damn fucking important.”
She leans forward suddenly, and her hair slides from her shoulders like water, dark gold curtaining her face, eyes blazing.
“How many times did Elodie make you come?”
My heart skips a beat.
Deflection, I wonder, or Desdemona’s way of rising to the challenge I’m throwing at her? Certainly, she isn’t shy. Repressed, maybe, and probably so rigidly self-disciplined she’s never committed so much as one selfish act as long as she’s been alive, but she’s not shy.
And she’s not a coward, after all.
“Wouldn’t you rather know how many times I made her come?” I ask, lowering my voice, so she knows this isn’t so much a question as an invitation. She’s leaning down over me, and I can smell her hair, sunshine and expensive soap and an unexpectedly sweet perfume.
“Why would I want to know that?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know what you’re not getting?”
“There’s more to life than the pursuit of pleasure,” she answers.
I draw closer, the tip of her shiny shoe brushing against the edge of my thigh. “You wouldn’t have to spend time pursuing it if you let someone give it to you.”
“But not you, right?” she says.
She doesn’t move away, though, and her foot rests right against my leg, and despite the layers of her shoes, socks, my trousers, I can still feel the warmth of her skin, the pressure of her contact like a solar flare, the radiance of it.
“Why not?” I ask.
I hold her gaze—I won’t be the one to look away, and normally, that would be power, but right now, I have the odd feeling that we’re both caught in the same trap.
“We’re allies, aren’t we? And I’m capable of great generosity.”
“For a price,” she says, her tone accusatory, almost rueful.
I shake my head slowly, placing one hand on her leg, the one that’s crossed over the other, depositing my thumb first on the outline of the tibia, then my fingers pushing softly into her calf.
If you’re going to stop me, Desdemona, do it now.
“Consider this offer on the house,” I murmur. “For the sake of our bargain.”
“You’re breaking rule two,” she replies, but she doesn’t move away.
She does the opposite, in fact: when I gently push her leg aside, she spreads her thigh ever so slightly, letting me in.
Ah, we’re well and truly in the bear trap now. The iron teeth are dug deep, and ripping free would surely be more costly than staying.
“This doesn’t count,” I tell her softly. I brush my thumb up the ridge of the tibia, to her knee. Her fingers tighten on the edge of the desk, and a wave of goosebumps ripples up her thighs, disappearing behind the dark pleated fabric of her skirt. “This is—research.”
She narrows her eyes, but they’re hooded, shadowed, a defiant spark in them like a kindling flame.
“You’re not going to find what you’re looking for,” she says.
But try anyway, her eyes seem to add.
“When was the last time someone made you feel good, love? I know it wasn’t Julian.”
My voice is barely a whisper. Outside, night has fallen without my notice, casting the room in shadows. The only light is Desdemona, her unexpected reactivity—a girl breaking out of a shimmering shell.
“What a unique and special talent to have,” she retorts, just as quietly. “To know so much about someone from just looking at them.”
“I didn’t know Julian wasn’t pleasing you from looking at him.” I tilt my head. “I knew from the way you looked at him.”
“You think I look at you any differently?”
“No.” I laugh, soft as a caress. “You look at me like I’m scum.” I’m so close my breath flutters the golden strands of hair that have fallen across her face. “You kissed me like I was scum.”
She falters, catching her bottom lip with her teeth.
“I kissed you like I was trying to convince my friends we’re together.”
I meet her gaze directly, openly, despite the danger, like staring right into an eclipse.
“Do you still want to?” I ask her.
For a moment, she doesn’t say anything at all.
“I don’t want to blur the lines,” she says finally, so low I barely hear her.
My breath catches in my throat; I don’t know whether to laugh or weep.
“Oh, I think the lines are blurred, love. Whether you like it or not.”