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“No.” He’s still holding my hand, his eyes piercing and hypnotic.
“Then why me?”
“Did it make you feel safe? Help you sleep at night?” His thumb glides over the empty space Reid’s ring has occupied right up until the moment I stepped into the shower today. Without it, I feel like part of me is missing. But that part of me has no place here tonight.
“Yes,” I answer.
The air between us crackles, and my tongue sneaks out between my lips to relieve the dryness that is slowly overtaking them.
A smirk tugs at his lips. “Then I guess you have your answer.”
“And the flowers?” I ask, already knowing the answer.
“Yes.”
“The Santa gift. That was you too?”
“Yes.”
“Then why? Why push me away? That night in your father’s office. You were hurt, and I offered to help you. Why do all those things for me if you were only going to be rude.”
He closes his eyes and pinches the bridge of his nose. The tension rolling off his shoulders hints that he regrets allowing me inside his head. “That night in my father’s office, I was in pain. It was an impulsive reaction.”
No. As a nurse I’ve seen reactions due to pain. This was something else. “Try again. The truth this time.”
His eyebrows furrow as his eyes narrow into exasperated slits, but I’m not backing down. This is my chance for answers, and I’m taking advantage of it. I want to move forward with him. It’s all I can ever think about. It’s why I’m here, now, not wearing the ring Reid gave me. But I can’t let this man in until he gives me something back.
Just when I think he isn’t going to answer, he speaks. “Because you weren’t mine. Because I wished you were. Because I knew your touch would be gentle and sweet. Pure, even. I knew it would be everything I ever wanted and nothing I could ever have. And that pissed me the fuck off.”
Oh.
I wanted truth. Now I have it.
“Are we done?” he asks. His expression tells me he’s had enough.
He drapes his arm across the back of the sofa, stroking thin strands of my hair between two fingers. His intense gaze has captured my full attention, and his other hand is now resting gently on top of mine. Callisto is very skilled at the art of distraction. But we’ve only chipped the tip of the iceberg. There’s so much more I want to know.
I clear my throat and sit up straight. “Almost. How did you know? About Nathan… that he was…” Probably the guy who put that stuff in my car. That he was the guy who killed Reid.
His jaw tightens, but he remains calm. “I read the paper. Like most of the population, with the exception of you, apparently.”
Fine. He has a point.
“What about the Orpheus ball? Why didn’t you just tell me who you were then?”
His stare never falters, and I wonder if he even has a nervous bone in his body. “Would you still have danced with me?”
“Probably not,” I answer truthfully.
At that point in time, Cal Suppato was nothing more than an over-privileged, womanizing creep who couldn’t decide if he wanted to be civil towards me or spit rude words in my face. Until the night he touched me in Carlos’s office, I wanted absolutely nothing to do with him.
“Was it a game to you? Seeing how far you could bend me until I broke?” I ask, trying not to read too much into it, knowing if I do, I’ll end up frustrated.
“A game? No. More like a test.”
“Did I pass?” My pulse pounds at the memory of the ball, of the first touch I’d felt in a long time, a touch that awakened a sleeping giant—his touch.
“No,” he says simply, “and neither did I.”
