Page 20 of Top Shelf

“Take my hand, Wren.”

At the soft coaxing of my voice, those honey-brown eyes of hers snap to mine, and what I see in them knocks the air frommy lungs. Fire—so much fire—but buried beneath the burning embers is something much more vulnerable.Fear.

It freezes me momentarily. Given everything she has survived, it’s understandable, and yet something about that fear, that fire, feels…personal.

I search those eyes, pushing deeper, craving answers to questions that I have no right asking, and yet I am. I’ve spent three years asking myself these questions. Questions I never thought I’d get answers to. And now she’s right in front of me, but it’s not as simple as outright asking. It’s clear from the way she moves, the way she scans a room, that there is trauma there. Demons that she carries. I’m not about to make that worse.

The opposite, in fact. I want to help her.

That’s all I’ve ever wanted.

Since the moment I saw her that night.

As if sensing I’ve seen too much, she wrenches her gaze away. With a bolstering breath, she practically smacks her hand into mine. My lips twitch, enjoying laying witness to her inner strength as I tighten my fingers around hers and lead her to the dance floor.

The ballroom hums around us, polished and golden, while the string quartet plays something soft and classical. The dance floor is crowded with people, but when I guide Wren into the swirl, it feels like the air shifts around us.

Her back is rigid beneath my hand. Her fingers occasionally twitch in mine. She’s not relaxed—far from it—but she doesn’t pull away either. There’s heat where our bodies touch, even through layers of expensive fabric. She smells like something soft and complicated. Vanilla, maybe. A little citrus. A little bite.

I move slowly, giving her a rhythm to anchor to, and after a few careful steps, she falls into sync. However, she doesn’t allow her body to relax and flow with the music. Her everystep is practiced, controlled. Just like everything else about her. Everything about Wren Winslow is wound tight, like a spring that’s about to give. A volcano about to blow.

A few beats pass in silence, and I let them, using the opportunity to soak her in while she looks everywhere and anywhere but at me.

She’s stunning. Anyone with eyes can see that, but that’s not what holds me.

It’s the contradiction.

The strength in the way she holds her chin high, and the fragility in the way her breath catches when I pull her a fraction closer. The fire in her eyes…and the shadows just beneath them.

She’s all sharp edges and soft fractures, but the way she angles her body like she’s ready to bolt if I make one wrong move? The flicker of something in her eyes every time I shift my grip?

Gwendolyn Winslow is afraid.

She hides it well. Dresses it up in confidence, but it’s there for those who care to look close enough.

She’s scared of me…and I hate how much I want to prove she shouldn’t be.

“You’ve been avoiding us,” I eventually say. She’s deftly slipped our clutches all week. Classes haven’t begun yet, and we’ve refused so far to creep into her personal space, so we’ve been trying to track her down any time we’re at the rink for practice, but any time we catch so much as a glimpse of her, she disappears to God knows where. Clearly avoiding us. She must remember us from that night, but why go to such extremes to stay out of our way?

“Have I?” That sharp gaze of hers lifts to mine, the exact shade of honey indeterminable from beneath her thick line of eyelashes. I fight the smile threatening to grow.

“Why?”My fingers flex against her spine, my gaze searching hers for any hint of an answer to my question.

Her lips press together into a flat line, her gaze once again skittering into the crowd. “Maybe I’m just not interested in whatever game you’re playing.”

“And what game is that?”

She tilts her head, expression carved from granite. “You tell me.”

I search her face, determining my next course of action while I steer us through a slow turn. I sense I’ll get further if I give her a nugget of truth, so I quietly murmur so only she can hear, “We looked for you, you know. After that night.”

Her breath catches. It’s not the kind anyone would notice unless they were cataloguing every flicker of motion the way I am. Her eyes flare with something I don’t catch before they hurriedly drop to my collarbone, as if something about my tie is suddenly fascinating.

One beat. Two.

She says nothing.

But something shifts between us, like a ripple in the water, and I know I’ve touched something raw. The air around us feels different somehow. Her movements, if possible, become even more stiff, and I suddenly sense that she is no longer here in the ballroom with me. So I don’t push. Not yet, at least. Patience has always been a quality of mine. Something Silas and I have in common—unlike Lucian, who has the patience of a gnat.