Page 44 of Guarded By the Phantom

He watched me expectantly. I blinked a few times, digesting this, and finally decided it wasn’t objectively bad. If nine-year-old Phantom had to eat the people who tried to kill him to survive after they hurt him… well, so he did. If I looked past the gruesomeness of it, it sounded a lot like justice.

When I sat down and put a forkful of delicious pie in my mouth, Phantom settled on my bed, watching me intently.

“What?” I asked after swallowing. “Have you never seen a woman eat?”

“After telling her what I just told you?” he asked incredulously. “No. In fact, you should be hurling about now. Go on. Be disgusted.”

I shrugged and took another bite. God, this pie was sogood.I didn’t understand why I’d denied myself in the past. Though, it was easier to eat without my mother staring at me with derision across the table. Maybe I could find a way to have my meals in my room, without her judgmental company.

“Well, I’m not. Why do you want to disgust me?”

“Because I can’t handle this weird limbo!” he exploded, throwing up his arms. “Come on, doll. We touched. You grinded on my cock. I need this to go one way or another. Either climb on top of me and let’s do the nasty or tell me you hate me so I can move on.”

I choked on my next bite.

Grinded. On. His. Cock.

Oh.

Chapter 15

Phantom

Oh, no.Shit. Fuck!

I fucked up royally. She stared at me with wide eyes, her hand pressed to her mouth, utter shock on her face. And of course.Of fucking course.I was crude, I was hideous, and really, what did I expect? This girl deserved to be wooed. She deserved poetry sung under her window, and not…

Not me. Telling her todo the nasty.

“I’m sorry,” I said, standing up. “I’ll see myself out.”

Also, what?Sorry?I was totally turning into that doormat, though Nat had assured me wanting to treat someone nicely didn’t mean I was losing my self-respect. Well, he was wrong. I felt like a total tool.

“Wait!” she called urgently, pushing away from the desk when I was almost to the door. “I… I’m not sure what to say. I just don’t want you to go.”

I shivered, hesitating. I wanted to stay, too. It had absolutely killed me to keep my distance and make a pretense of my professional integrity. I was at the end of my tether.

Because I missed her. I wanted to tease her and make her laugh, and it almost didn’t matter that after my task was over, I’d never see her again. I could probably take it, if only I got to do some of the things that obsessed me on the long nights when I smoked in the garden while she watched me from her window under the cover of the dark.

That was the worst thing. Her looking. I didn’t know what it meant, and it made me hope. But hope was ridiculous.

“I just told you ugly things, doll,” I said, shaking my head. “Things not for your ears. Tell me you hate me so I can get my head on straight.”

“But I don’t,” she said, puzzled. “You’re the only person I like. I mean, apart from Madame Morozova. I like her, too.”

I turned with an incredulous laugh. “You like that shriveled old prune who says you have horse legs and dance like a swan that had too much vodka on an empty stomach?”

She shrugged, blushing. “Well, she treats me like a person. And you do, too. So… I don’t understand exactly what you need from me, but, uh, we could maybe negotiate.”

She raised her eyes, and her expression was so hopeful, so utterly vulnerable, it shook me to the core.

Fuck.She was lonely. She liked me because I didn’t kiss her ass like the rest of the world or harp on her like her mother. A hot shiver pooled in my guts when I realized what she meant, too.We could negotiate.She thought I wanted sex from her, and she was ready to give me something just so I would be her friend.

What a fucked up little princess.

“Forget what I said,” I demanded, vehemently vowing to myself to never, ever make a pass at her again. Not like that. “It was just a stupid joke. I make too many of those.”

And it would stop. No more jokes, no more trying to get in her pants when I knew fucking better. I would be good. I wouldbe her friend, talk to her, help her out with everything, and then I would catch everyone who threatened her so she would be safe.

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