Page 18 of Witch You Weren't Here

He did a slow blink and looked around the – admittedly innocuous – living room. ‘I’m really not following. I’ve only had half a pint and that was hours ago. What are you talking about?’

Wow, he was really going to make her spell it out. Kay groaned and pushed herself up from her chair, the brochure crinkling as it stuck to her bottom. He did a double take at it, and she was forced to peel it away under his surveillance before she crossed to the threshold of the bedroom, flinging an arm out to indicate the entire space. ‘It’s pretty obvious what you use this place for.’

‘Sleeping?’ He followed her over. He was wearing a maroon jumper over a white shirt, and both smelt of aftershave and his warm skin. ‘Is this a thing you can see with your gift? Because I’m really not getting it.’

She sighed and pointed to the circular hooks at the head and foot of the bed. ‘These. To tie your partner up.’ Then she gestured to the plate on the ceiling. ‘And this. For the sex swing. I’m not an idiot, y’know.’

His mouth opened and shut a couple of times. ‘Is that …’ He tilted his head. ‘Is that what those are for? I figured they were just industrial-style post-modernist bed knobs or something. And I didn’t even notice this.’ He moved beneath the metal plate for the swing and gazed up at it with the guileless curiosity she couldn’t help remembering. Then, when he darted a look at her out of the corner of his eye and his mouth hitched up at the side, she recognised another one of his expressions. Teasing.

Only she’d always mistaken it for a joke they were sharing, when it was much more likely he’d been laughing at her, rather than with her.

Well, she wasn’t some gullible sixteen-year-old anymore and he wasn’t going to have fun at her expense.

She huffed and crossed her arms. ‘So they were just here when you bought the flat, were they?’

‘What?’ The half-smile dropped and he frowned at her for a moment before going back to examining the plate. He stretched his arm up and looped one digit of his index finger through the hook and tugged on it. His jumper and shirt both rose with the motion, threatening to untuck from the waistband of his trousers. ‘I don’t own this apartment. Why would you think that?’

‘You said you had a place.’

‘Yeah, to stay in, not that I live in.’ He gave a soft laugh, as though the idea was daft.

Kay bristled. ‘Well, how should I know that?’ I don’t know you anymore, I don’t know if I ever knew you. ‘You said you had a place and then brought me here to it.’

He paused in his scientific exploration of the base plate for the sex swing, lowering his arm back down and putting his hands in his pockets. ‘But you saw me get the key out of the lockbox.’

That was a good point. Not one she’d considered while her imagination rampaged off with him fan-cast in the starring role of a 365 Days remake. The heat in her cheeks flared again. ‘So? Maybe that’s just what people do over here. Or maybe you rent it out as an Airbnb when you aren’t using it.’

‘Because I’d like to share my red-room with even more strangers?’ He raised an eyebrow and his soft lips pressed together as he looked at her, his eyes narrowing slightly as though her furious blushing was giving something away.

A tense silence stretched out and it was only now that his laid-back attitude was receding to reveal a grim sort of resignation that she realised how her complaint might look to him. Like judgement of his sex life.

Shit. He was telling the truth. And she had let her careening emotions bulldoze her common sense.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, rubbing carefully underneath her glasses before settling them firmly back in place and looking him straight in his deep blue eyes. They had a guarded quality to them, but she held his gaze, maybe for the first time since they’d met in Prague, to be sure he believed what she said next.

‘Look, I’m sorry for jumping to the wrong conclusion about this place being yours and then freaking out about the kinky shit. It was nothing to do with any assumptions or judgement about you personally, just the evidence.’ She waved her hands at said evidence. ‘I didn’t think it through and my only excuse is that I’m exhausted, and I don’t want to be in Prague at all, let alone snuggling up to go to sleep in someone else’s soft-porn set.’

His gaze flickered across her face for a few more quiet seconds before he gave a little snort and scraped his teeth over his bottom lip, his shoulders lowering. ‘I’d call you a prude, but clearly you know more about the exciting side of bed-sport than I do.’

Her face was practically melting off her at the intensity of her blush now. In a minute, she’d be able to add her own skull to her non-existent collection. She’d claimed not to be an idiot, but the leaps and bounds her imagination had taken had left her looking decidedly idiotic. ‘Who the hell calls sex “bed-sport”?’ she asked, like a crabby old woman.

He shrugged. ‘Someone who doesn’t recognise BDSM fixtures and fittings when they’re right next to his head?’

She rolled her eyes and looked away, determined not to smile at the self-deprecating humour. It was all an act. She had to remember that. She was not going to let herself be charmed by him. This should be awkward. He shouldn’t be able to joke and flatter his way out of the estrangement he’d instigated.

‘Look, I understand it was unexpected, he continued. But the reality is, whenever you stay in a hotel or a holiday cottage or a caravan, the last occupants most likely had sex in it. That’s why people go on holiday, isn’t it? Or where they’re having affairs.’

‘Right. But that reality isn’t usually slapping me in the face while I’m trying to get some sleep.’ Really, Kay? ‘Slapping’ you in the face? Great choice of words there.

‘So, as long as you can employ plausible deniability, it’s all fine?’

‘Yes. Maybe that’s irrational, but—’

‘It doesn’t matter if it’s irrational – it’s making you uncomfortable.’ Harry looked down at the covers, his fingers shifting restlessly through his hair. ‘The bed seemed newly made when I arrived yesterday, and only I slept in it last night, but would it help to have fresh bedsheets?’

A tiny cold spot inside her chest thawed at his consideration of her feelings. Then she remembered that she’d been tricked into thinking he cared about her feelings before too. It had just made it hurt all the more when he’d trampled all over them. ‘Yeah,’ she said shortly. ‘I can handle that though. It’s late.’

She went out to grab her suitcase and coat, and when she returned to the room, she caught him chewing on his bottom lip and frowning at the bed.

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