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CHAPTER ELEVEN
EVE
The candlelight flickers in the darkened bathroom. I breathe in the warm almond-scented air and allow it to relax me deeper into the water. The rehearsal for the end-of-term showcase ran late, making me grateful that Henry moved our time together to tomorrow evening.
I miss him. I miss the short bursts of conversation he strikes up in between the music. Oddly, I even miss watching him work at the coffee table in his suite. Ridiculously, I miss our silences too. They’re heavy, like a weighted blanket that envelops you. An overwhelming ache flutters in my heart.
Maybe he misses me too. The thought whispers softly, trying to soothe the longing inside me. That unrelenting yearning to feel his touch, his breath on my neck, his fingers squeezing my flesh. The savage bite of his words as he threatens to tear me apart. But mostly…mostly, I long to feel his weight over me again. The unforgiving hardness of his body pressed into mine.
God, I want him. I want him so damn much that my need for him suffocates me.
The ringing of my phone in my bedroom jolts me up in the water. Pulling a towel from the radiator next to the bath, I get myself out of the bath and wrap it around me as I race to my room, practically tripping over my own feet in the hopes that it’s him and that he wants to see me.
“Unknown” flashes brightly on my screen, and before the call goes to voicemail, I answer. Excitement swells in my chest as apprehension squeezes it tight.
I can barely get words out as I whisper, “Hello?”
A deep breath rasps down the line. The sound of sirens in the background is jarring. They’re too loud. Too close. And panic unfurls deep inside me, making it impossible to catch my breath or think past the sudden assault of fear.
“Hello?” I call into the phone. “Henry? Is that you?”
I know it’s him. I feel it in my gut and in every fibre of my being, as though we’re somehow connected. My body hurts, and my head throbs with an unrelenting scream.
There’s another deep rasp that I hardly hear past the blood pounding in my ears before the call dies. My first instinct is to call back, but there’s no number. I can’t call or text.
What if something’s wrong?
I’m not sure why Henry would call me if something’s the matter. But the feeling doesn’t go away. If anything, it grows the more I force myself to ignore it.
By the time I’ve dried myself and I’m about to put my pyjamas on, I’m a head case of nerves and dread. Before I can talk myself out of it, I put on an outfit that I know will be all right for the club—a black tube dress with a high neck that covers the marks on my neck and black chunky-heeled boots that are easier to walk in than the shoes I normally wear to the club. As I head for the door, I check my backpack to make sure everything I could need is inside.
The block is eerily quiet as I take the stairs down quickly. Clara’s place is so quiet that it seems wrong. I put the feeling down to my already edgy nerves that have me chasing the stairs down faster when I go through the darker spots. As I run out the door, I notice the sedan parked right opposite me.
Since Andrew will take me anywhere, I get in, much to his surprise from the raise of his browns in the rearview mirror.
“Do you know where he is?” The question bursts from my lips before I even think of greeting him. “Umm, sorry. Hi? Good evening?” I’m not really sure how to greet him now that I think about it.
“The Duke?” he asks me in return.
“Yes. Him.”
“I don’t keep His Grace’s diary, miss.” There’s a terse edge to his reply that gives me pause. However, before I can say anything, he asks me, “Where would you like to go?”
“Can you take me to him?”
With a deep breath, Andrew starts the car. He starts crawling away from my building at a snail’s pace. “Like I said, Miss Cameron, I don’t keep the Duke’s diary.”
Okay. “Hush. Please take me to Hush.”
Without a word, he speeds up. The drive is unnervingly quiet. He’s watching me in the mirror, the same way I’m watching him—warily. I think he’s mad at me from his cumbersome inhales and exhales every time our eyes meet. Or maybe he doesn’t like me. I don’t know, and right now, I don’t care either.
The car has barely come to a stop when I jump out and run up the front steps to the club. I almost fall through the threshold as the door opens before I knock.
“Miss Eve.” The butler smiles at me.
I wave at him as I start up the stairs, breathlessly taking up the second and third flight so that my head is fuzzy and my throat is ripping raw when I reach the top.
Holy shit! Either I’m unfit as hell, or that’s a lot more stairs than usual. I’m a panting mess, folded over so that my hands are braced on my knees. Desperately, I try to catch my breath before I head to the suite.
