Page 47 of Tempest

His grip loosens, not by much. Maybe he believes me. I’m speaking mostly the truth.

“You’re part of the reason my sister nearly died that night.”

Tempest can’t see my face, but I keep it blank regardless. It helps buffer the words coming out of my mouth. “It was an accident.”

“What was?” Tempest’s question contains curiosity, naturally, but also a cutting edge.

“The car. The driver, I mean. He swerved to miss a pedestrian and—”

“Is that all you remember?”

“I can still see Mila.”

“How?”

“Lying still. Not breathing. Covered in bl—” I hitch at the memory. “Blood.”

“Anything else?”

“Clover waking up. Asking me what happened, and then I … I couldn’t answer her. I wasn’t me anymore. I was—I was ten again, but not with those men. Somewhere new. Foul. Another terrible place where girls die and men murder and nobody wins.”

Tempest clucks his tongue. “The world is cruel, princess. It’s why I will never stop asking you to slink back into your tower, cuddle up to your father, and bathe in the protection of four solid walls. Don’t for a moment think that this university contains your salvation.”

“I would never. But I am jealous.”

I’m as shocked at speaking the truth as Tempest is at hearing it. “Jealous of what?”

“Clover. How she’s adapted to this new life without Mila and how untraumatized she is by it all.”

Tempest’s fingers move to my neck, stroking. I don’t find them soothing. I’m certain he’s exploring my delicate tendons, wondering where best to squeeze.

“Appearances are about as misleading as magicians,” Tempest says. “There’s something about this pathetic display of showmanship that winds me up tight.” Tempest’s voice travels over the top of my head. Low with bass.

“Is it the drawing of blood, do you think?” he muses. “Or could it be how you look tonight, so sparkling white and innocent among all these amateurs? Mm.”

Tempest draws in a breath. Oh my God, he’s sniffing the top of my head. Scenting me.

“Fuck, you smell good,” he growls. “Fresh flowers within the ruptured ground. A full bloom among seedlings.”

He grinds into the small of my back. I have trouble breathing. Instead of recoiling, I relish the sensation of him, so close to my core yet so far, creating an ache inside me that I’ve never needed filled before.

Causing confusion. Coaxing heat.

I squirm on my feet, staring forward and keeping my body stiff as a board. I don’t know what’s happening. I thought Tempest hated me or at the very least, was annoyed by his little sister’s best friend. Fragile, pathetic, stupid.

“I can hear your thoughts, you know,” he mutters close to my ear. I close my eyes, shivering. “You’re much too hard on yourself, princess, when I can be hard enough for the both of us.”

My lips part. It’s almost impossible to keep staring forward and pretending deep interest in the next boy who steps up to Professor Morgan, offering his hand and guffawing at the sight of the knife. “Yo, you think this’ll get me the train of chicks I want for Christmas?”

“I don’t enjoy being distracted by you, especially at this moment,” Tempest mutters over the dumbass. I try to whirl on him, to demand he let me go home, but he holds me rigid in front of him, grinding against me casually like he’s testing out my worth.

“I—I don’t want this.”

Tempest chuckles, his hot breath playing with the strands of hair at my nape. “You tell me you’re not afraid, yet here you are, trembling at the mere sensation of my dick up against your ass.”

I search desperately for what a cooler, more confident girl would say in my position. Tempest always brings out the worst in me, those insecure nuggets that I’m not good enough, that I’m stupid and deserving of my fate.

“Against my costume,” I correct him. “Your dick is up against my thick, multi-layered dress that barely feels your little—”

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