Page 37 of Unbind

Darcy holds up her hand. ‘Wait. I’m going to grab a bottle of wine from the office. Give me a sec.’

‘But the two-drink rule…’ I protest faintly, and she scoffs.

‘Oh please. We all know that’s to stop drunk dickheads not taking no for an answer and women from getting hammered and then not being able to remember if they gave consent or not. Meanwhile, the only people dicking me down tonight are Max and Dex and they’re used to me being tipsy.’

Hard to argue with that.

She returns with a glass of wine filled to the brim.

‘Classy,’ I observe.

‘Says the girl who spent the night with the infamous Adam Wright,’ she says airily, and I roll my eyes.

‘It wasn’t like that at all.’

‘Better fill us in, then,’ Maddy says.

So I do. I give them bare bones: my hypo here; Adam’s presence and his—very unexpected—skill level at reacting to my crisis; his insistence that I go home with him; the feeding and the gifts; the hyper vigilance around my glucose levels; the insane house porn. And as I talk, their eyebrows rise and rise till they’re practically in their hairlines.

‘So nothing happened?’ Maddy asks when I’m done.

I give her my best unimpressed look. ‘I had a really bad episode! I wasn’t in any fit state to make bad decisions. Besides, I wouldn’t touch him with a barge pole.’

‘That’s not what I asked,’ she points out, and I roll my eyes.

‘Nothing happened.’

‘You didn’t see him at all in the night? Because I’m sorry.I know we hate him. But he’s stupidly hot. He’s been in there for ten minutes and he’s already got women fawning all over him.’

That makes me mad. Madder than I should be. Unless I’m mistaken, he very much propositioned me a few minutes ago, in a spineless, roundabout kind of way.

I bet that guy fucks anything that moves. But the fact that he doesn’t have to lift a finger to do so pisses me off.

So I tell them. I tell them about him sneaking into my room at his place with testing kits and a huge erection, and I tell them what he said to me just now. It’s childish, and I hate myself for indulging this line of gossip about a guy who I wish would just fuck off and leave me alone, but I know my audience, and I know these two will go feral for it all.

I’m not mistaken.

Their squeals of mirth have one of the doormen opening the heavy front door to make sure no one’s being murdered.

‘Oh dear God,’ I mutter.

Darcy clamps a hand over her mouth. ‘I have to say something, and you’re going to hate me,’ she says through her fingers. ‘Two things, actually.’

I take a deep breath. ‘Go on.’ My tone isn’t exactly encouraging.

‘One, as Mads said, he’s really hot.Reallyhot. I’m sorry, but it’s true.’

I give a little nod of my head to suggest I’m not going to fight her too hard on that fact, even if I hate it, because the girl has eyes. No one in their right mind would try to argue that Adam Wright is ugly.

She pulls her hand away, emboldened. ‘And… I know what he did to your brother. I mean, I don’t know much, obviously, but I know enough. But it’s hard to square all that with everything you’ve just told us. He sounds like he was…nice?’She screws up her face apologetically at the last word, and Maddy winces like she can’t believe Darcy went there. ‘So maybe you guys could find some, I dunno, middle ground?’

‘Bymiddle ground, she means his dick,’ Maddy chimes in helpfully.

I roll my eyes again. ‘I figured as much. Look, I know you’re trying to help. But I’m not looking for anything from him. I can admit that he may only be ninety-five percent bad, but the stuff he did to my brother—that’s a total dealbreaker. Got it? And it’s not like he meant what he said to me, anyway. Like you said, he’s got women crawling all over him. I’m sure he won’t let one rejection keep him down for long.’

I’m sure he’s already lining up his next fuck.

I stew for the next ninety minutes.

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