“Do me a favour,” Max called from the base of the staircase.
Loren slowly turned. Looked down at him.
“Don’t hold his behaviour tonight against him,” Max said, his bass voice gentle. “Heistrying his best to help you. Don’t forget that.”
Loren managed a slight nod before retreating to her suite. It wasn’t until she was half-asleep, with Dallas already snoring softly beside her, that she recognized the undertone to Max’s words, the tone that suggested she possibly wasn’t the only one in this house who was in need of some help.
20
Loren breezed into the kitchen at Hell’s Gate the following morning, where she found Darien sitting at the island. He was sipping coffee from a mug, today’s issue of the Daystar spread before him.
He glanced up at the sound of her polished academy shoes tapping on the floor, but Loren made a point not to look at him as she yanked open the fridge door and rummaged through the contents in search of milk.
He had kept her up all night screwing some chick he’d brought home from wherever he’d gone at two in the morning. She hadn’t been able to sleep as the girl had moaned and cried out in pleasure; as the mattress had squeaked, the bedframe banging against the wall. Loren had been so desperate to drown them out that she’d stuffed earbuds into her ears, but the music had created barely enough of a distraction to muffle the sound of the girl’s pleasure.
It was absurd, the amount of noise she was making. Absolutely absurd, and to be completely frank, Loren was disgusted by it.
Darien seemed to sense her frustration as she pushed aside cans of beer and takeout containers in search of the milk carton. Her head was right inside the fridge, the temperature chilling her skin.
“What are you looking for?” he asked.
She made to answer him, but then her hand finally closed around the carton. “Found it,” she muttered as she yanked it out, kicked the fridge door shut behind her, and peeled open the seal.
“Help yourself to some coffee,” Darien said, his tone so much softer than it had been last night. The Daystar rustled in his hands as he returned to perusing it. “You sound like you need it.”
Loren peeked over her shoulder at him. The white muscle shirt he was wearing hugged his upper body like a second skin, drawing attention to his biceps and sculpted chest. Loren tried not to think about where those hands of his had been last night as she watched them turn the newspaper to the next page.
Loren bristled at the unwelcome thought. Why did she evencare?“You’re right, Idoneed caffeine,”she snapped. She stood on her tiptoes and yanked a box of puffed rice cereal from the top of the fridge, ignoring the Hob crouching behind the box. She set about pouring herself a bowl, her motions so hasty that several grains of cereal bounced to the floor. “Especially after you kept me up until five a.m. with all that squealing.”
Darien was silent for so many minutes that she eventually turned to face him. He was watching her with a hint of amusement in his eyes, the corners of his lips slightly upturned.
“As much as I would’ve thoroughly enjoyed making a girl squeal last night, that wasn’t me.” He took another sip of coffee, assessing her over the rim. Loren blinked, the question that was at the tip of her tongue evident in her gaze. “That was Travis,” he clarified.
Loren felt her icy expression thaw as blush flooded her cheeks, spreading all the way down her neck and to her collarbone. “Oh,” she said, feeling very stupid. She had assumed it was Darien—but she hadn’t stopped to think about where, exactly, the squeaking and moaning were coming from. Come to think of it…the sounds had been drifting from the opposite side of the house—the side where Darien’s room was…not. His was down the same corridor as hers. Only two doors down, in fact, which meant the conclusions she’d drawn made absolutely zero sense.
The blush flooding her cheeks grew hotter.
A smile played on the curve of his mouth. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were jealous.”
“Hardly,” she grumbled. The look on Darien’s face had her glaring at him. “Oh, don’t flatter yourself. It’s not like I cared. I care about being kept awake, but you can do whatever you want. It’s none of my business.” She shoved the milk carton back into the crowded fridge, grabbed a spoon from the drawer, and took the bowl of cereal into her hands. She shovelled a heaping spoonful into her mouth, savouring the cold temperature of the milk on her tongue, willing it to calm her reddened skin.
Darien turned to the next page of the Daystar. “Whatever you say,” he muttered, that hint of a smile still clear as day.
The irritation—and the sheer embarrassment of having borne such emotion to him, coupled with their argument last night and how she’d allowed herself to cry over this stupid, brooding boy—simmering in her veins overflowed like a volcano erupting, the last of her flimsy self-control snapping in two.
“You know what, Darien?” she said in a cheeky tone. “You’re nothing but a cocky, narcissistic male who’s managed to convince yourself that every woman in the world wants to screw you.”
His eyes snapped up from the paper. His expression darkened—a darkness that had nothing to do with the Sight, and yet was somehow just as terrifying.
Loren bit her tongue. A metallic warmth flooded her mouth, and her tongue turned numb from the pain.
“You want to take that back?” Darien said, his lethal voice sharp as glass.
Every trace of the blood that had reddened her skin a moment ago vanished, her head turning weightless on her shoulders. “I’m sorry,” she sputtered. “That came out wrong.”
“I’ll fucking say.”
Pathetic—she waspatheticfor saying that, especially after what Max had implied about Darien last night, that he didn’t quite have it all figured out, at least not as much as he pretended to. She wasn’t sure what had gotten into her, but she was mortified at the realization that she was doing a thorough job of pissing off the one person who could help her. The one andonlyperson who was willing to help her. “I’m under a lot of stress—”
