Hands bare, I reach carefully forward as a tear slips from my eye.
He freezes.
His fingers twitch when the tip of my nail skims his palm. His throat bobs as I draw my hands together and hold my crystal heart to my chest.
“Your hands,” he whispers, staring straight at my fingers. “I’ve never seen them…before.” He presses his lips together, wets them, takes a determined step back. “I hope this makes you feel better. Sleep well tonight, little dove.” With that, and nothing else, he turns away.
Stunned, I step from my apartment, feel the change in the floor beneath my feet, and jerk back inside. “Wait,” I blurt.
Malcolm stops, but he doesn’t look back. “Yes?”
“You found her.”
His head dips. “I did.”
“You found her, after days and days of looking, yet you’re just giving her back?”
His hands close, and he turns his head, so I can see his profile. His eyes remain focused on the wall beside him, squarely off me. “Would you prefer I ask you to grovel for her?”
I wince. “Obviously not. It just seems out of character for you to do something this…kind. Without any further expectation.” Hardening myself, I say, “You spent four full days looking for her. I saw you walking all over every time I looked at your location on my phone. At least give me a hint of what you expect in return.”
His lips tug upward until an awful smile paints his face in wicked shades. At last, his gaze drags off the baseboards to pierce me. “You want to know what I expect, huh?” He swings himself back around and pockets a hand. “How about…a heart for a heart?” He presses a finger to his chest. “Mine’s lonely without yours beside it.”
For reasons unknown, I flush.
His lashes lower, and he stares, fixated, before pressing his closed hand to his lips. His own cheeks darken until he’s a portrait of deranged adoration laced in insanity. “I love you.”
My stomach twists—or possibly it flutters.
“Don’t think I haven’t noticed how much that little thing means to you. You’ve not been sleeping for days, and you’ve barely been lucid during the spare moments we’ve crossed paths when I’ve had to stop in at the office for meetings you couldn’t reschedule. Playing with you is no fun when you’re not present to play with.” He takes a step forward. Then another. And another. Stopping in front of me again, he lifts his bare skin a centimeter from my face. Index finger curled an inch below my chin, he says, “I expect you to rest tonight, wake relieved and refreshed tomorrow, and respond to my good morning text for once. Then, if you’re feeling especially grateful, maybe come see a movie with me after your meal prepping is done.”
Painfully aware how close he is to touching me, I echo, “A movie?”
“If you’d rather not go to a theater, my place has a private one.”
His place. Right above our heads.
“We can watch anything you’d like.”
He’s under my flesh, invading my bloodstream, and I don’t know what to do about it. Not at all. Stepping back and away from his almost-touch, I say, “I’ll think about it and let you know in the morning.”
He returns his hand to his pocket. “Torment me with the anticipation, then.” He scans me from head to toe, letting his gaze linger an extra moment on my bare hands. “You’re okay?”
I’m holding something his bare skin touched against my bare skin. But I get the feeling his question has nothing to do with that. I say, “Yes.”
Sincere, he smiles, and the corners of his warm gray eyes crinkle. “Good.”
I breathe past the weak flutter of my heart in my chest. “Thank you.”
He lifts a shoulder, turning again. “I’d do anything for you, dove. You don’t even need to say a word. Just look helpless and see how fast I bend over backward in an effort to fix it.”
“You…actually care about me, don’t you?”
“Careis certainly one word you could use. Perhaps the weakest, though.”
“I don’t understand you,” I whisper.
He tuts. “I know. And I like it that way. Make no mistake, Azalea. Everything I do serves my own purposes. I’m not vying for peace between us, and you certainly won’t catch me chasing something as meager as affection. Not now. Not after coming this far already.”
