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My throat closes up before I can taste the eggs.
I put my cutlery down and push myself to my feet. “Thank you for breakfast. It was delicious.”
And I walk out, curling my fingers into fists so I’m not tempted to rush back and pick up the pencil screaming my name.
Chapter18
Cian
We all watch Everleigh walk out. The second she hits the stairs, she’s sprinting up them.
I release a quiet breath because she could have so easily chosen to dart past them and out the front door instead. She’s stayed. For now. Who knows how long that might last?
“What the fuck was that?” Kylian hisses as he drops his utensils on the table.
Rune is staring at the pencil and sketchbook, wearing an expression of abject devastation. He rakes a hand through his hair. “I was so sure it would make her happy. She was smiling, and now…” He shakes his head, mussing his hair even more. “How could I have fucked up?”
She’d blanched when she’d seen the pencil and sketchpad. I’d swear she’d stopped breathing for a second.
I need to know what someone—probably Lawrence—did to create a reaction that extreme, and I need to make sure we don’t trigger one like it again.
Pushing my chair back, I rise to my feet.
“Where are you going?” Kylian calls after me.
“I think it’s time for one of my dance lessons,” I say quietly.
And also an opportunity to find out why she would react to that pencil as if it had been a dagger that Rune intended to use on her.
* * *
“Where do you want me?” I hold my arms out as if I don’t know what to do with them. “Feel free to manipulate me into whatever position you need me to be in.”
I inject a bite of dry humor into my voice. It doesn’t come easily, but I try. If she knew the positionsIwanted to manipulateherinto, she would turn around and walk out of our ballroom.
Everleigh, looking pretty in her knee-length white linen dress, audibly gulps. “Um…”
I wait in the center of the room, trying to hide how eager I am to have her put her hands on me.
“You, uh, you need to…” She gestures vaguely and her voice trails off. Probably when she realizes dancing is not agiving directions from a distancetype of situation.
She peers at me blankly for so long that I wonder if maybe I’m pushing her into something she can’t handle and doesn’t want.
“If you don’t—”
“No.” She takes a step forward, her back visibly stiffening.
I witness the strength and the grace in her as she moves toward me. What I’m seeing isn’t the practiced fakery they teach at the Haven Academy. You can spot the girls who graduate from there from a mile away. They all move the same way. Chins tilted a little high, smiles a little too practiced. Something not quite… real about them.
Manufactured. They create the sort of omega that they believe the wealthy families want.
Everleigh is fluid. Like a limber tree swaying in the wind. Supple. Strong. She moves in a way that makes a man want to watch her, keep watching her, and wish she were his.
Did Lawrence think someone would steal Everleigh from him? Was that why he went to so much trouble to drown her in his pheromones?
“I agreed,” Everleigh says firmly, moving toward me. She holds her right hand out for mine. I place my left palm in hers, trying not to feel too pleased as her breathing changes. Not a lot, but the subtle sign she’s responding to my touch is too pleasurable to ignore. “You have to put your right hand on my back.”
I move closer and place my palm on the center of her back.
