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So I take up the seat Blair had occupied before and lean in as close as Shiloh will allow. I lower my voice to be barely audible, because even I’m not sure I can follow through with whatever he answers.
“What do you need, sweetheart?”
A blank coldness stares back at me.
“Nothing from you,” he says with a hollow voice. “You have enough of me. You don’t get this, too. This one is mine.”
Then he turns away, and it’s as if I no longer exist—as if the world itself no longer exists.
The Shiloh Novak I’ve come to know—the one who keeps waking up in hospital rooms and bossing me around in my own bed—he isn’t here right now.
After something like this, I’m not sure if there’s any bringing him back.
The drive back to the dorm is tense. It’s spent with me fighting the urge to pull over and drag Shiloh into my lap until he wakes up and lets me back in.
Atlas picked Blair up as we were leaving the hospital, and though he had a million questions in his eyes, he said goodbye with only a one armed hug to his friend and ushered his boyfriend away.
I half expected Shiloh to refuse coming back, but all he did was draw his hood up and curl up in the passenger seat. When we arrive, he climbs out and disappears into the building before I even turn the car off.
He’s waiting at the door to our room, fingers tracing the wood in nonsensical patterns, and doesn’t turn when I approach. I almost ask why he waited when I remember I have his phone and keys in my pocket.
The room is dark when we step in, and Shiloh doesn’t bother to flick the light on. Instead, he walks straight to my bed and flops faced down on it.
My skin tingles.
He’s exhausted and is in no frame of mind to be testing boundaries, but I can’t help but think the move was intentional. Sure, it takes more energy to climb the ladder to his bed, but I’ve seen his sore ass make it up there after a long session and pass out almost immediately.
Beyond wanting to draw Shiloh out of his shell, there’s a part of me aching to have my hands on him in other ways.
I want to card my hands through his hair and dig my fingers into his scalp. Not to hurt but to soothe. I want to inspect every inch of his body for whatever was done to him. I want to kiss every scrape, every bruise, until his body is mine again.
Until I take back whatever was stolen from him.
“Shiloh.” My mouth moves before my brain can catch up, and the little peek of Shiloh’s eye as he lifts his head off his folded arms is enough to keep it going. “Tell me your safeword.”
His brow furrows, and he pushes onto his elbows with a frown—the most expressive he’s been all evening.
“Your safewords. Remind me what they are.”
The longer the silence, the louder the blood pounds in my ears, but the way he swipes his tongue over his lip and gulps tantalizingly slow almost evens it out.
He purses his lips and raises his eyes to mine.
“Starfish to be done. Yellow to slow down.”
I grip my shirt by the collar and yank it over my head.
Those eyes watch me with a repressed hunger. Whether it’s my body or what he knows I can give him, it’s still there.
“If you don’t want what’s coming, use your safeword.”
I sit down in my desk chair facing the bed and pop the button on my jeans.
His arms tremble as he rises to a sitting position. Cross legged with his back against the wall.
“You wouldn’t touch me right now.”
The zipper goes down. I cock a brow.
