Page 40 of Glitched Fates & Stolen Mates

He glanced towards the front door, and something in his posture suggested he was about to leave.

“Don’t you want to know about all the other times?” I asked suddenly, feeling like maybe he did think I’d just made the whole thing up. He already thought I was a complete loser, and now paranoid was getting added to the list.

“Oh,” Kit replied. “Right. Well… you’re probably tired now. Maybe that can wait.”

He wants to get back to his Friday night plans.

“Right,” I said. “Okay. Sure.”

I couldn’t stop staring at Kit and his drenched clothes. Should I offer him a towel? His whole body screamed discomfort—way more than his usual awkwardness around me. Maybe he was as desperate for this awkward encounter to end as I was.

“But… if you’re scared, I can… stay the night?” he said.

What. The. Actual. Fuck?

“Only if you want. And not… with you, obviously. Not in your bed.” His words tumbled out in a rush, his face going alarmingly red. Comically red. “I’d sleep on your sofa, or outside the front door of your flat if you’d rather.”

I blinked at him, mouth agape, stunned into silence.

Was he insane? There was no way Kit Thorne was sleeping in my flat tonight. Or outside it.

“You’d… sleep in that dirty corridor outside my flat?” I eventually asked in disbelief.

Yet he nodded in certainty. “I just want you to feel safe, Felix.” He looked at me then, and his expression reminded me of the traumatic nosebleed incident—that same, deeply sad frown as when he’d cleaned my face.

I must seem completely pathetic to him.

“But…” Kit said. “I guess you might want to call Wren? Have him come here?”

Why does Kit keep bringing up Wren every five seconds?! Does he think he’s my only friend or something?

I shook my head. “No, honestly, it’s all fine. If I do have a repeat stalker, he’s probably watched me from the window a dozen times. I’m sure he isn’t going to randomly attack tonight. Especially as he probably saw that I clocked him.”

“Okay,” Kit said, nodding and turning for the door. I tried not to sigh in relief.

He paused. Turned back.

“Oh, by the way, Seb has also asked me to train you in self-defence. We should have insisted on this a long time ago, but…” He glanced away, guiltily. “You’ve always been safe locked away in the hotel basement…”

My stomach dropped to the floor. Self-defence? What would that even entail? Kit wrestling me to the ground? Kit’s massive hands wrapped around my throat in a chokehold? Kit pinning me down whilst I struggled beneath him?

Oh God. No. Please, no.

“I can tell him you’d rather someone else do it?” Kit offered quietly.

“What?” I managed to squeak out. “Why would I want that?”

To be honest, I would—for various reasons—but I wasn’t going to tell him that. I couldn’t exactly explain that the thought of Kit’s hands all over me during combat training made my brain short-circuit until it fizzed. That I wouldn’t be able to learn anything, because I wouldn’t be able to relax.

Kit’s expression shifted to something unreadable. “Right. Well. We’ll start Monday, then.”

The water from Kit’s soaked cardigan had formed a proper puddle on my carpet now. He was the very image of a drowned wolf—dark hair plastered to his skull, stubble dripping, that massive frame somehow made smaller by the sodden wool clinging to his shoulders. His eyes had gone all wide and uncertain, and something about his posture suggested Kit wanted to say more but couldn’t find the words—his jaw worked like he was chewing over something difficult.

“Um… bye…” I ended up saying, to fill the weird silence.

He flinched like I’d shocked him back to reality. “Have a nice weekend, Felix.”

After Kit left, I triple-locked the door and slumped against it.