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“Holy fuck—” She covered her mouth, as if stifling a scream. A flush tinted her cheeks when her mittens came away from her mouth. She gazed around. “What are you doing here?”
I had to admit, that wasn’t the greeting I’d hoped for, and though my jaw killed me like a son of a bitch, I was happy I’d been there to catch her instead of letting her fall on her ass.
As well as hold her.
My hands full of her ass, I didn’t let go, her cookie aroma all up in my nose. Our breaths puffed around us, and I wet my lips. “I don’t know. Why aren’t you sick and inside?”
She blinked, as if only being aware of that now. Her hands on my shoulders, she wriggled and apparently wanted to be put down, but I didn’t right away, waiting. She huffed. “I took a mental health day. Just came outside to smoke. Ares keeps his weed around so yeah. Smoke.”
Nodding, I allowed her to slide down my body and felt every inch of that shit. It’d been too long since I’d had this girl in my arms, in my hands. “Is that what you needed last night? A mental health day?” She had canceled on me, which I’d been bummed about.
I still had Sloane pressed to my body, and we were both aware of that. She eased herself away, and it killed my insides I had to let her. We still had this weird shit between us, and I didn’t want to test it. She tugged her coat down. “Uh, yeah.”
Nodding again, I pulled my Zippo out of my pocket. I flicked it on for her, and when she didn’t do anything, I frowned. “You said you came outside to smoke.”
As if remembering that, she patted herself down, but peculiarly, she came away with nothing. She tugged her hair out of her face. “I must have forgotten it upstairs.”
So, she slid down a tree and nearly died… for nothing. I shook my head. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I’m fine. I just forgot it, okay?”
She was certainly on one hundred right now, being weird. I’d question it a little more, but things were weird between us right now.
She probably doesn’t know how to act around you.
She stepped away from me but swung around when I asked her about my dad’s car. I shrugged. “Do you know why he’s here?” It wasn’t that my dad didn’t come over to the Mallicks, but it wasn’t usually when he was normally supposed to be at work. Really, since Ramses was my mom’s best friend, only she came through for the most part when it came to impromptu visits.
“I don’t know. I…” She cut a look around, again being weird. “I’m going to go. I need to go for a walk.”
“Little fighter—” I got her arm, but she tugged away fast. My stomach clenched. “Hey. You all right?”
“I’m fine. I just want to go for a walk so just leave me alone.”
I didn’t want her going for a walk. I didn’t want her left alone. She started to walk away, but when I went with her, I noticed something.
She hadn’t been the only thing to fall from that tree.
I’d missed the black duffel bag, the thing stuffed with shit. She picked it up off the snowy ground, but when she started to go, I worked her around. “Dorian, let me go.”
“No.” I got her in both hands, my throat tight, my breathing uneven. It looked she was going somewhere, and if she was, she was going to face me with that shit. “Why do you look like you’re leaving? Leaving me? What the fuck’s in that bag?”
“It’s nothing. Just—” She cringed. “Please let me go. You don’t understand. I need to go, and you need to let me.”
She said she wasn’t going to run anymore, so if she was running from me, I wasn’t going to let her. My jaw moved. “I know I was shitty to you. I know I fucked things up.”
“No. No.” She was crying, a flush to her cheeks. “I don’t want to leave you, but I gotta leave. I can’t be here anymore.”
I blinked, not expecting that answer. I gripped my hair. “Well, did something happen with Ramses and Brielle? You and Wolf get in a fight? What—”
“No. I just need to go. I need to clear my head. I just need to get out of here.”
She was saying this, but I realized she no longer tugged away. In fact, her hands gripped my jacket, her face pressing into my coat.
“Take me away,” she rasped, her arms sliding into my open coat. She meshed our heat together, her own body shaking. “Please take me away, Dorian.”
Alarm bells went off in my head, my little fighter burying her face into my chest. I didn’t know what was fucking going on, but for some reason she didn’t want to be here.
I made her look at me. “Tell me what’s going on.”
