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“Chaos,” Dice answered.
“Oh. Got it.” She dropped down on the other couch.
Kaden steered me forward, and my body followed his lead. I was too stunned to want to think on my own. Plus, he’d gotten us out of there. That had earned him some trust, even if only for tonight.
He urged me toward the couch in my suite. All I needed was a little nudge to take a seat.
He disappeared into the bedroom, then came back with a blanket that he draped over my shoulders.
I clung to it, pulling it tight around me.
“Whatever that was, can it get here? To this place?” I asked, following his movements.
“No. It can’t happen here. Outposts aren’t here or there, so to speak, but a space in between—a buffer zone, if you will.”
He went to the sidebar that I hadn’t touched since I moved in. He carried back a glass, handing it to me.
“Here, drink it. It’ll help.”
Help? That was all I needed to hear. I took a long gulp, struggling to keep it down, hating the taste but liking the warmth when I felt like I was an iceberg.
I kicked off my shoes, wondering if they had blood on them, and tucked my legs to my chest, curing into a ball under the blanket, wondering if Kaden was going to stay or leave.
I scrambled for a way to keep him here, the man I usually tried to avoid, and yet was ready to tackle if he took a step toward the door. He said it couldn’t come here, but right now, after having felt it, nothing made me feel confident.
“What was that, exactly? You called it Chaos, but it didn’t sound like you meant that as a generic term.” I looked up at him, wishing his arms were around me again.
“It’s not generic. Chaos is a thing that happens at times.” He topped off my glass with a bottle I hadn’t realized he’d brought over.
He took a seat on the other side of the sofa. I wanted to crawl on top of him but restrained myself, feeling like sanity was creeping back in time for me not to make an absolute ass of myself. It had been close, though.
“But what is it?” It was a legitimate question, but I would’ve asked him about the flooring, or the light fixtures, if it would keep him here for a little while longer.
“Have you ever heard of the chaos theory?” he asked, reclining and resting his arm on the back of the couch.
“No,” I said, and all I could think of was that he didn’t look like he was leaving in the next couple minutes.
“Butterfly effect?” he asked.
“Yes. I’ve heard of that.” I rolled into a ball on my side, waiting for him to continue.
“They’re basically the same thing. It’s the theory that a small change can ripple out and cause a larger effect.”
A heavy dread filled me as the logical cause of the initial change hit me.
“That was because of something a tinker did.” I hadn’t thought it possible to be more shaken.
He took a sip of his drink, making me wonder if tonight had affected him as well, even as he seemed to be as calm as ever.
“Might not have been a tinker. There was a change that had a greater effect down the road. Things had to be realigned. That’s when this Chaos happens.” He shrugged, as if accepting tonight as the way it was.
“Youknewsomething was going to go wrong.”
“I didn’t know, but I’ve been at this business long enough to sense ebbs in the energy, feeling a hint of it coming.” He put his glass down, looking like he was going to stand.
I shrugged off the blanket, getting to my feet. “I have some brownies in the kitchen. I should’ve gotten you something to eat,” I said, as if he were a guest and I was a normal person in the regular world.
Shit. I didn’t have a kitchen in my suite. Where were those brownies? Didn’t I bring some of them in here the other night when I was having a pity party? I scanned the room, searching for something to give him.
