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I swallowed, not trusting my voice. Before I could answer, he reached out and took my chin gently between his fingers, angling my face up so he could search my expression like he was looking for cracks.

I couldn’t make myself pull away.

Ryder cleared his throat loudly. “Okay, well, I’m gonna go…examine your window from the outside and see if there’s any sign of a forced entry. You two—carry on.”

“Okay,” I whispered, hating how dazed I sounded.

The door clicked shut behind him, and suddenly I was alone with Sterling and the panic I’d been trying to outrun since I’d first noticed the window.

Sterling’s thumb brushed my jaw. “Tell me everything,” he said.

“I came in after…the hike,” I said, my voice wobbling around the memory. I kept my eyes fixed anywhere but on him, because looking at Sterling after what we’d done, after what he’d done to me, was asking for my face to spontaneously combust.

“And things were moved,” I went on, trying to stay focused. “My dresser drawer. The window latch. A brochure I’d put on my table. And—” Heat crawled up my neck, not from embarrassment but from the crawling sense of violation that hit me every time I pictured a stranger’s hands in my things.

“Someone touched my underwear. They picked it up and folded it.”

Sterling’s eyes flashed, feral and razor-bright, as if he’d just been handed a reason to do violence. It was a look that made my pulse spike for several contradictory reasons.

I rushed on. “And there was a phone call. A weird one. It could’ve been a prank, though. Maybe some kid just breathing into the line. Or—or someone got the wrong roo⁠—”

“You’re not staying here,” he said firmly.

I blinked. “Excuse me?”

“You’re not staying here. You’re coming with me.”

My heart thudded. “Sterling, I’m probably overreacting. It could’ve been housekeeping or⁠—”

“Housekeeping didn’t fold your underwear,” he growled. “And they sure as hell didn’t call you.”

He stepped closer, his hand gliding from my jaw down around my throat, his fingers settling there firmly. It should’ve scared me. Any normal person would’ve jerked back, but somehow it steadied me instead, like he’d found the exact point where the fear inside me lived and he was pressing against it to keep it from spilling over.

“I—I can’t just⁠—”

“You can, and you will,” he said calmly.

I shook my head. “No. I’m not staying with you.”

His eyes darkened. “Sienna.”

“No,” I repeated, a little stronger this time, even though his hand at my throat made my knees feel like decorative suggestions. Sterling’s expression didn’t flicker. If anything, something rapacious slid through it, like he’d been waiting for me to say it one more time.

“No?” he murmured in a silky, dangerous tone that sank through me in one shivering line.

I opened my mouth, possibly to argue, possibly to faint; it was a toss-up, but I didn’t get the chance.

One second I was standing on my own two feet.

The next, Sterling had wrapped an arm around my waist and hauled me over his shoulder like I weighed as much as a decorative pillow he’d decided belonged in a different room.

“Sterling!” My protest dissolved into a startled squeak as he turned on his heel and stalked toward the door.

He didn’t pause, just moved with terrifying purpose, one hand braced behind my thighs, the other reaching for the door handle like he planned to solve this entire situation using brute force and pure audacity.

He threw the door open.

Hattie stood there on the threshold, mid-knock, wide-eyed and breathless. “Oh, thank heavens, I came as soon as I heard⁠—”