I kissed her back because it was muscle memory at this point.
Her hands undid my pants so she could have me. “I’m a little hurt that you’ve been here for a week and haven’t called…”
When her hand moved underneath my boxers, I pulled away.
Both of her eyebrows rose in surprise. “What’s gotten into you?”
I zipped up my fly and fastened the button. My thumb automatically went to my mouth to wipe away the lipstick she’d undoubtedly left there. My hands settled into my pockets next, and I kept my distance.
She crossed her arms over her chest and cocked her head as she regarded me. “Magnus?”
“I didn’t call because I didn’t want to.” I stared her down, eyes burning with fire, my voice ringing with authority.
Her playfulness evaporated when she realized this was serious and not just a mood swing. Her lips fell into a frown, and the confidence left her gaze. “I don’t understand…”
“There’s nothing to understand. We were fucking—now we aren’t.”
“We’ve been fucking for months, so that’s a bit abrupt, don’t you think?”
I looked at the wine display on the wall. I didn’t deny her just because I was in a bad mood, but that definitely made my reaction harsher. The second her lips were on mine, it felt weird, like she’d never kissed me before. I didn’t like it. Felt a little sick, truth be told. She wanted me because I was rich, powerful, and good-looking. It was an investment, getting into my pants and then my heart so she could have everything that came with me. It made me angry…because she didn’t know me at all. She didn’t know who I really was. “Not really.”
Her eyes narrowed farther. “A man only turns down sex with a beautiful woman for one reason…he’s already getting sex from another beautiful woman.”
That wasn’t the case with me.
She waited for me to look at her.
I shifted my expression to her face.
“I thought you didn’t commit.”
“I don’t. I’ve just lost interest, Stasia. Don’t read too much into it.”
She came closer to me, strutting as she moved across the hardwood floor, her heels tapping. “Men don’t lose interest in women who look like me. So, the reason your dick is still in your pants is because it’s loyal to someone else. Interesting. Who is she?”
I held her gaze and saw the jealousy, anger, and betrayal swirl in her eyes. I was the big catch she wanted to reel in, the man she wanted to take care of her, the man to buy her everything she wanted. And once her plan failed, she was furious. I turned away to leave. “No one.” I never promised her anything. It was her mistake to assume she could be what Melanie was to my brother. “Like I said, you’re reading too much into it.”
Fifteen
Forgiveness
I had to return to the camp in a few days—with Raven.
I wasn’t excited about it. I’d always hated going to the camp, but now I loathed it. The guards hated me, it was hot, and now I had to share what little space I had with the woman who betrayed me.
I’d be there for a month before I got to leave again.
I sat in the living room upstairs, drinking scotch while sitting in front of the TV, my mind slowly slipping away. I was in my sweatpants without a shirt, ready for bed but too lazy to actually get up and walk into my bedroom.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her figure emerge into the darkness. Her body was highlighted by the light of the TV, becoming brighter the farther she moved into the room. Then she stilled when she knew I saw her.
I sat up on the couch and looked directly at her. “I told you not to come up here.”
“I wanted to talk to you.” She moved in front of me, blocking the TV behind her.
“You can talk to me all you want—downstairs.” I grabbed the remote and turned off the screen.
“I tried, but you just walk away—”
“Because I don’t want to talk to you.” I threw the remote down and got to my feet, leaving my glass of scotch on the table to be finished tomorrow morning. “I still don’t want to talk to you.”
She didn’t move.
The longer I stared at her, the angrier I became. I didn’t like her in my space. I didn’t like her walking up here like she had every right to do whatever she wanted. Whenever I was kind to her, she pushed me for more.
“Do you really want to do this for the rest of our lives?”
I stared at her blankly.
“Because I don’t.”
The silence suddenly became louder, like a buzzing in my ears, but her words had so much weight…and I didn’t understand them. “Do what?”
Her eyes changed, like she was surprised I didn’t understand her riddles. “You need to forgive me, Magnus.”
My body tensed all over.
“Let it go.”
I took a breath, my nostrils burning as the air rushed out like hot smoke.
“The entire reason you feel this way about me is because I care about people. You saved me because I didn’t deserve damnation. Going back and trying to liberate the women I left behind is completely in my character, so you weren’t surprised. I’m sorry that it complicated your life, turned everyone against you, but let’s not forget what the situation is here.” She stepped closer to me. “You work at a camp that enslaves innocent people…and I’m an innocent person. To assume I wouldn’t try my hardest to help those women is naïve. I stand by what I did, and I would do it again…and you respect me for it.”
Flashbacks of that night came back to me, the smoke that rose into the nighttime sky, the screams from the women as they fled, the shouts of the guards as they tried to get to the fire extinguishers in one of the cabins that was already in flames.
“You need to forgive me, just as I’ve forgiven you.”
“Forgiven me?” I whispered. “For what?”
“For being part of such a heinous operation.”
“I didn’t ask you to forgive me—”
“But I do. Because I see who you really are, Magnus. I know you’re a good man who would never hurt anybody. You’re just in a bad situation, for reasons I don’t understand because you won’t share them with me.”
My hands moved to my hips, and I stared at her in my upstairs parlor, seeing the way her emotional eyes pierced into me as if she demanded something from me. “What do you want from me?”
There she stood in her little shorts and top, her hair pulled over one shoulder, looking at me like she never looked at anybody else. Her expression was full of sheathed affection, as if I were a person who meant the world to her. It was similar to the way she looked at her sister, but with more substance. “I want you to let it go. Because if this is going to be our lives for…the foreseeable future…I don’t want it to be like this. I don’t want my face pressed against the bedroom wall so we don’t touch. I don’t want you to snap at me every other second. I don’t want you to lock me up because you think I’m going to run and get you killed. I want…us.”
Maybe she had no idea I’d stood right outside the bedroom door and heard the entire conversation between her and her sister. I knew exactly what she wanted, but I hadn’t given it to her because I was so furious at the way she’d betrayed me. But it was getting more difficult to hold on to my anger…especially when I believed every word she said. I fell right back into the place I used to be. “I’m not going to let you go, no matter what we are.”