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I laughed under my breath. “I forget you know everything.”
Adrian raised his glass in mock cheers. “That would be correct.”
I dragged a hand down my face, my anger still bubbling. “I was probably just as obvious.”
Adrian winced, raising his eyebrows.
“I didn’t exactly try to hide it,” I defended.
Adrian nodded once, a sharp drop of his chin. “But did you tell her?”
“I didn’t have to.” That was fucking bullshit. I’d told her I loved her a thousand ways. I just hadn’t gotten around to saying it yet.
It would have fucked up the fragile thing we had going for so many years. And I sure as shit wasn’t going to be the one to mess it up. Hadn’t exactly pegged Daphne as the one to do it either, but life had a way of surprising me.
A small slither of guilt snaked through my stomach. I understood why she’d be angry. Shit, if I heard that she only wanted me for sex I would be fucking pissed too. But the thing in my chest, that made me need and want her with equal fervor, would have never allowed me to leave.
Adrian took another drink. “Daphne may be smarter than all of us, but she can’t read minds.”
It was like he wanted me to slap the cocky expression off his face. “And I’m supposed to be taking advice from you? You, who makes it your life mission not to form an attachment.”
Adrian shrugged. “Attachments are messy. I don’t do messy.”
“Then bugger out of my mess.”
“I’m just saying,” Adrian said, adjusting the cufflinks on his suit. “She probably freaked. I know it fucking stings that she left the same way Nikolas did, but they aren’t the same.”
They weren’t. My brother didn’t have the ability to carve my heart out of my chest. I dragged a hand down my face again, then dropped my forearms to my knees. “I don’t know, man. My instincts are screaming at me that I shouldn’t believe her.”
“Why?”
“Because what if she does it again?” I wouldn’t survive that.
Adrian let out a long breath. “Did she apologize?”
I nodded, unable to confront the memory of the sheer agony in her eyes.
“Then you have to decide if that’s enough.”
I didn’t know. Not right now. Not while the wounds were still fresh. I wanted so badly to believe her, to trust that she loved me even half as much as I loved her. I just needed to get to a place where I could set aside my anger and see what Adrian saw.
I lingered in Adrian’s office, tossing back two glasses of his most expensive whiskey just to see him squirm. I needed the drink, but he also deserved it for being a cocky, advice-giving asshole.
Dominic appeared at some point, only sparing me a sideways glance and asking Adrian “Is he okay?” before abandoning the subject and letting me stew. I stared out Adrian's window, out to the peaks of Olympus and out over the city lights.
When we all parted, I went right back to the bottom of the sea floor. I needed to let this anger pass before I did something stupid and lost Daphne.
Because I’d turn the ocean to acid before I ever did that again.
Chapter 30
Daphne
“Are either of you listening to me?”
“Yes,” Lukas and I said at the same time. Our eyes swung to meet each other for a loaded second before dropping. I wasn’t sure who’d moved away first.
Zale’s eyes narrowed, catching onto the lie. Mine, at least. I hadn’t absorbed a single word he’d said.
