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“I think I’ve had enough for tonight as well,” I say and the girl’s face sharply jerks my way as if she now suddenly doesn’t want to leave. Mr. Bryce nods.
“Zinnia, show Mr. Rowe to his room then.”
The girl stares at me and I give her a tight smile. It seems like she’s about to protest but then she sharply gets up and walks out of the dining room. I tell my hosts good night, then walk out into the hallway and I go and get my luggage.
She waits for me at the end of the staircase, her hands toying with the banister as if she’s anxious and she turns, asking me to follow. Her gentle hips swish from side to side as she goes up the steps and I can tell that she’s angry but it only makes me want to laugh.
Makes me want to bury my face in her hair and hold her too. She can be happy with me if she allows herself to let go but I realize that I have made a mistake. I didn’t understand how deep her roots to the Bryce family go. Didn’t understand that she feels like she owes them whatever they want just because they took her in.
She’s going to have to betray them if she’s going to stay loyal to me and it might sting, but it can’t be changed. Some things are the way they are because they are meant to be that way. And the girl and I are like that. A man doesn’t normally feel the things I feel. A man’s whole world is not supposed to revolve around a woman but mine does. And I don’t know how to make it stop.
Other than to make her merge with my world.
“Do you want to sleep on the second or the third floor?” she asks and I rasp,
“Where do you sleep?”
Her shoulders tense. “On the second floor.” She bites her lip. “But I don’t want you to sleep next to me.”
A flash of agitation spikes my veins.
“Miss. Zinnia,” I say softly. “If I wanted to get to you in your bed then no lock can keep me out.” Taking a stumbling step back, her eyes flare and I curse, straightening. “Forgive me. I didn’t mean to be so forward.”
Licking her lips, she slowly nods, “Mr. Rowe, I hope that you realize that I am someone’s fiancé?”
And I hope she realizes that he is now out of the picture.
I give a curt nod and she continues,
“And I’m going to marry soon. This year as a matter of fact and then I’m going to live in this house and get my happily ever after.”
“Do you really believe that?” I ask. “Do you really believe you could be happy in this house with a man who will never satisfy you and only force you to pump out a kid year after year?”
She gasps. “Please, don’t talk to me that way.” She looks horrified but I know I’ve hit a sore spot and she shakes her head in confusion. “I should show you to your room.”
The girl leads me to probably the darkest and draftiest corner of the house but I don’t mind and she stops outside of a door. “This is it,” she says, nudging her chin before taking a breath as if gathering courage, “Mr. Rowe can you promise me that you won’t do anything wrong while you’re here.”
I can’t promise her that because I’m going to enjoy things that are wrong. Together with her.
“Wrong?” I ask with raised brows.
“Something you shouldn’t do.” She looks at me hesitantly. “What was it that you whispered when you k...kissed my hand?”
She knows perfectly well what I whispered and there was a flash of excitement in her eyes when I did but now she is trying to hold back. Now she is trying to pretend that she can be a good girl and resist me.
“Have you ever been hunted?” I ask and her eyes widen but she shakes her head. “Well...rest assured that now you will learn exactly what it’s like.”
3
Zinnia
I sleep poorly that night and the next morning I already feel like adifferent person and I think I look different too. There’s a strange, feverish sheen to my skin and a reticent glimmer in my eyes. I had dreams I can’t remember and when air travelled in through my open window, I felt cold but in the next moment I felt hot again.
My whole body seems to be going through a change, a change that I barely know how to handle but I know someone who can.Hecan. I try to tell myself that Mr. Rowe is only a mere stranger but my body won’t have it. It fills with need and my heart seem to swell at the sheer thought of him. On top of it, I feel an unfamiliar ache in my womb that I don’t know what to do with. I’ve never felt it before, didn’t feel it the day before yesterday or the day before that.
I make an ice bath in my sink and dip my face, closing my eyes and the chill should be numbing and distracting but it’s not doing much for me. I’m still warm and fervent when I shouldn’t be. Why couldn’t I have been attracted to Morton and his tic-tac breath and his serious conversations about why investing in crypto is not for the rabbles?
It would have been so much easier.
