Instead, I have to endure this dinner and watch her treat him like her master. Laurel works harder to please Sin with the food she made him, most of her attention, her amusing stories. All of it makes me so fucking angry, I can hardly think straight.
I recognize the repentance in her, the desire to make up for possibly slighting him, even if he didn’t see it. I would love that instinct, if she directed it at me. It’s wasted on Sin. Whether it’s how he has learned to handle her or just because I’m here, he is stonewalling her. Not as harshly as I did, much more stealthily. He’s withholding just enough to make her worry, just enough to make her sweeter, just enough that he collects looks from her ranging from slightly eager, to longing, to desperate for his approval. His carefully controlled responses don’t make her think he’s being a dick to her, they make her think she’s hurt his feelings—and Laurel isn’t big on hurting feelings, so it’s exactly the right card to play.
I hate to fucking admit it, but he’s playing her like a goddamn fiddle, and she doesn’t even know. It’s a little like watching Mia dance around Mateo, except that after years spent learning his ways, my cousin’s wife knows what he’s doing. Laurel has never played this game before, so she doesn’t have a clue.
I should tell her.
No, I shouldn’t tell her, I should have someone else do it. I wish I had some ex-girlfriend of his I could dig up, but even thinking of digging up Sin’s ex is frankly gruesome. Someone needs to shed some light on him for Laurel, but it can’t be me. It won’t work coming from my lips. I’m too obviously invested and given our history, anything I say against him is more likely to make her dig in loyally like she has tonight.
No, I can’t be quite so direct.
I’ll have to think of something else.
24
Laurel
When it’s time for Rafe to leave, he asks me to walk him to the door. Everything within me compels me to say no, but no seems not to be an option as his fingers lock around my wrist and he hauls me down the stairs with him anyway. I glance back at Sin, waiting for him to intervene, but he keeps making me handle this shit myself.
I consider the possibility of getting kidnapped from my kidnapper. It’s funny, but I don’t think feasible. Sin is quite capable of kidnapping me back, though I don’t know whether or not he would. Rafe is his boss, after all. Maybe that’s why he keeps letting Rafe get me alone like this. I’m not sure how any of this works.
As expected, once he has me alone by the door, Rafe asks, “You’re sure you don’t want to come home with me?”
“Yes, I’m sure,” I tell him.
I’m wary, uncertain how he’ll take it. Nodding, he caresses my hand and looks pensive. Releasing my hand, he leans in toward me. I think he’s going to kiss me so I lean back, but he already anticipated that. Instead of letting me pull away, he catches the back of my neck in a grip that should be tender, but it makes me want to fight him. Only there’s really nothing to fight. He doesn’t kiss me—not on the mouth, at least. He merely presses his lips to my cheek, but near enough that he can murmur in my ear, “Be careful with him.”
I frown, even though he can’t see me.
He must feel that he got my attention, because he goes on to add, “There are a lot of things you don’t know about him, Laurel.”
I go to pull back, and this time he lets me. His amber eyes meet mine, and I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. “There are a lot of things I don’t know about you, too.”
He doesn’t work harder to convince me that Sin is bad news, he simply tells me, “I just don’t want to see you get hurt.”
Given what I do know about these men, that’s alarming. It could mean what it would with any man—that my heart could get dinged up. But because of their professions—if you can even call them that—it could also mean something far worse. I’m understandably curious, but of course since he has my attention (or maybe because Sin is looming at the top of the stairs) Rafe doesn’t offer anything further. He gives my hand a little squeeze and tells me goodnight, then he’s gone.
Although he left a question hanging in the air, I feel relieved as I shut the door and lean against it, looking up at Sin. He stands at the top of the stairs, keeping an eye on things, despite his lack of intervention. My base instincts tell me I owe him for what happened in the bathroom, even though nothing actually happened. I also don’t belong to Sin, so even if something had happened, I’m not sure I would owe him anything. It’s not a logical thought; it’s a need, alive and pulsing inside me. I don’t know where it came from, why it’s there, or why I never felt it so strongly before I met
Rafe. Both of them have triggered it at different points, but since noticing Sin, it’s only him.
I did feel a twinge of something in the bathroom when Rafe told me no one could be at their best all the time. I didn’t like the idea of him thinking I only liked him on his best behavior. That’s fake. Of course I know everyone has uglier times, but his instant shift toward blistering coldness was another thing entirely. I wanted Rafe to feel my acceptance, that he could be human and I wouldn’t hold it against him, but I still felt tied to Sin, too.
Which I realize is also absurd, because I’m only going to be here a few more days. I’m not in a relationship with Sin. Hell, he may still tie my ass to the bed before he leaves tomorrow because he doesn’t trust me to stay put.
I still want to please him. I still yearn to kneel on the ground before him and look at him, for his firm hand to caress my face. I yearn to show him I’m still his good girl.
None of that really makes sense if I try to look at it logically, but I feel it. It’s like Rafe awakened something within me that Sin can touch, too, and I can’t put it back into whatever box I must have been keeping it before we met.
Sin watches me ascend the stairs toward him, but he doesn’t move. My skin warms when he stays put as I step on the landing. His hand slides around my waist and he pulls me close. I go easily, draping my arms on his shoulders and relaxing as my body presses against his.
“What did he say to you?” Sin asks, without preamble.
“Just now?” When he nods, I drop my gaze, but keep my arms and my body where they are. “He said to be careful with you.”
“Did he say why?”
I shake my head no, hoping Sin will fill in that blank for me.