My spine snaps upright.
This is the part where I run and ask for help, isn’t it?
But the truth is, I also don’t know what I’m capable of when it comes to Aiden either.
I never thought I’d be invested in him to the point of craving him, but he has a way of engraving himself under my skin.
“Do I scare you, Elsa?” He’s watching me with that manic interest as he lays my palm on his hard abdomen.
“No,” I say softly.
“Some things never change.” He chuckles. “You’re still such a horrible liar.”
“It’s not a lie,” I scold.
His stormy eyes plunge in mine. “I know when you lie, sweetheart.”
“How?”
“You have a tell.” He taps my nose, his expression playful. “Your nose twitches the slightest bit. You should school it.”
Is that what he did with all his tells? Did he school them?
“If I do, wouldn’t it be hard for you to tell if I’m lying?”
“I don’t need a tell to know whether you’re lying or telling the truth.”
“How?” I must appear confused as hell because he laughs.
“Try telling me something and I’ll say whether it’s true or false.”
“I came here alone.”
“Lie. I saw you with Reed. Try something I don’t know.”
“It isn’t fun if I play alone. How about one for one?” This is my only way to learn more about him and there’s no way I’m missing it.
I shiver. He drapes a sheet and his arms around me, enveloping me in a tight embrace. I’m half lying on top of him with his legs cocooning mine. It’s strange how natural it feels to be in his hold.
“You go first,” he says.
“I’m adopted.”
His eyes shine with something unrecognisable as he says, “Truth. But I already know that.”
“Fine. Your turn.”
“I wish I were adopted.”
I study him closely, and his face doesn’t change. “Truth.”
“False.” He grins. “I like who I am.”
“Do you?” I don’t know why I think he’s lying.
Logically, he has no reason to hate being King Enterprises’ heir, but deep down, I think he… doesn’t. Not in the way everyone expects him to, anyway.
“Is it questions now?” He raises an eyebrow. “I like questions better and I get to ask first.”
“Why?”
“Because you already asked yours.”
I roll my eyes. Give it to Aiden to twist everything to his liking. “Whatever.”
He appears thoughtful for a second. “Why were you adopted?”
I should’ve expected the question, but that doesn’t make the answer any easier.
“I’m originally from Birmingham. I’ve been told there was a fire. I lost both my parents in it, and Aunt had custody of me and eventually adopted me.”
There’s none of the pity I usually get on Aiden’s face. If anything, he seems calculative. “You’ve been told. As in you don’t remember.”
It’s amazing how nothing escapes him. What’s stranger is that I want to bare it all to him.
Aiden is dangerous, and could — would — use this against me, but at the moment, I don’t care.
“No. I don’t,” I say. “I only have fragments and little pieces. That time feels like a giant, black puzzle. Every piece is so similar, I can’t even start to gather it together. The sad thing is that I don’t even remember my parents’ faces and I’m absolutely fine with not remembering them. I’m such a horrible daughter.”
“Or it could be that your brain made a wise choice.” His voice drifts. “Sometimes, parents aren’t what they’re supposed to be.”
I want to ask him what he means by that, but his expression is closed. I doubt I’ll get anything no matter how much I push.
So, instead of poking his wound, I ask the question that’s been haunting me for years.
“Why did you decide you hated me the first time you saw me?”
I’m not going to sugarcoat it for Aiden. He was — still is — my bully. He ruined my life in RES. My body and mind might be unapologetically drawn to him, but that will never change what he did to me.
He stares down at me, but he’s not really seeing me. His grey eyes turn into a raging storm.
“You were a ghost.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
A ghost?
I was a ghost?
My head tilts back against Aiden’s chest as I study his features, searching to see if he’s joking or screwing with my head.
I should’ve known better since he doesn’t joke. At least not in this sense. His jaw is tightened and his thick lashes frame a darkened look.
“What is that supposed to mean?” I try to appear calm, but my pulse rises with every second until I’m afraid he can hear it.
“You’re not ready for what it means, Frozen.”
The fact that he’s using that damned nickname can only mean that he’s putting me at a distance.
Aiden isn’t exactly the closed-off type. He’s not ashamed to admit to all the fuckery in his head.
However, I’m not foolish to believe that he’d bare his soul to me that easily. He keeps a fraction of himself hidden behind the walls of his fortress.
Maybe I can’t escape his chessboard after all. One has to be in the battalion so they can take down the king.
“I don’t like it when you call me that,” I say, wiggling away from his hold.
“Call you what?”
“Frozen. I’m not frozen.”
“Hmm, but you are.” He pats his chest. “You’re so frozen, it kind of stings.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Aiden flips me underneath him and rips the sheet from around me. Shivers break all over my arms as the air hits my skin.
His ferocious gaze dips to my nakedness as if he’s seeing it for the first time.
My heart hammers so loud, it’s painful.
There’s something about the way he watches me.
A possessiveness.
An obsession.
A… madness.
I hate how my body reacts to this unhinged side of him. Aren’t all girls supposed to be attracted to the white knight? Prince charming? Why the hell am I gravitating towards the villain?
I ignore the pool of heat gathering between my thighs, pull at the sheet, and drape it around my torso.
Aiden’s stormy eyes pierce through my soul as his fingers tug on the sheet. “Don’t cover yourself from me.”
“We’re talking.” I hold the piece of cloth with all my might. “You can’t just shut me off for sex.”
“Watch me.” He rips the corner of the sheet.
I gasp and roll away from underneath him, taking the sheet with me. Aiden wrestles me back. I push at him. Lust, hate, the need to win rush through my limbs. I love fighting Aiden. Judging from the wetness coating my thighs, maybe I love it a bit too much.
It doesn’t help that Aiden’s eyes are gleaming with too much pleasure. He loves the fight, too.