Page 20 of Unspoken

Finally, the arsehole releases Logan’s T-shirt.

We start walking again. I mean Logan starts walking. I’m trying not to fall but my world spins, a carousel of smeared hues and dancing slot machines. Their jingle fades away as we leave the main floor.

My feet trip over each other, and the realization of my self-worth finally hits me like a ton of bricks. I resist Logan's grasp, determined to break free.

"Quit squirming," he commands, his tone leaving no room for negotiation.

Into the loo we crash, the door slamming behind us with loud finality. And then I’m knocked against the cold wall. Logan's presence is suddenly all-consuming, a gravity I can't escape, as he yanks at the collar of my jacket with both hands and glares at me with those scary gray eyes. My brother has gray eyes too but they are cold. Like metal. Logan's are different– quicksilver burning hot with uncontrolled intensity.

My heart pounds, a drumbeat of dread and something darker, induced by the presence of alcohol in my bloodstream.

"Do you not have any respect for yourself or your own family?" Logan hisses out. It’s a wrathful snake’s hiss—the sounds that come out of his mouth.

"Get off me!" I shout, though my angry command is slurred, powerless.

"Enough,Sasha," he says, and even through the haze, I hear the steel in his voice.

"No one gave you the right to call me that. Call me by my full name.Alexander." I don’t know why I say that. It’s in fact the opposite of what my mind wants. The way he said my name, the way the letters rolled off his tongue, it made my mouth dry. Or is it the liquor?

The room spins, and suddenly I'm lost in the storm of Logan McKenna.

The cold tile of the wall sears my back as Logan's grip slackens, only to shove me against it with a force that rattles my teeth. "You're acting like a child," he growls, eyes narrowing into slits of controlled fury. "Makes me want to treat you like one. Maybe I’ll get one of those traction belts they put on kids sothey don’t get lost. How about that, huh?" His voice drips with sarcasm, his question rhetorical but heavy with threat.

"Screw you," I spit out, but my voice lacks conviction, drowned out by the pounding in my ears. I'm pinned like a butterfly to a board, wings fluttering uselessly. But this close, I can see the flecks of silver in his irises, the rise and fall of his powerful chest, feel the heat radiating from his body despite the chill in the air-conditioned air.

"Is that what you want?" He leans closer, his breath hot on my face. "For me to put a fucking leash on you?"

I roll my eyes, not trusting my voice right now but things suddenly change between us. The tension in the loo is a living thing. It makes something in the pit of my stomach curl onto itself, this side of him—this raw, unbridled force. And there’s this feeling, this strange sensation, dark and sweet and strange and it whispers through my veins.

"You need to start behaving," Logan grumbles. "Do you understand me? Maybe it’s a game for you. It’s a job for me. My livelihood."

I'm silent and fuzzy and a little bit rattled, studying him—the crescent scar bisecting his temple and his hairline, the hard curve of his jaw, the storm brewing in his eyes, the shape of his mouth that speaks of sin. My heart hammers a dangerous rhythm, and in this charged silence, I wonder if it's just the adrenaline, the alcohol, or something far more dangerous stirring within me.

"Are you even listening?" Logan’s voice booms, snapping me back.

"Of course, I am," I lie, but my gaze lingers, tracing the ink that spills down his arm.

"Then get your shit together," he orders, stepping back, finally releasing me from the wall's unforgiving embrace.

"Or what?" The question slips out, reckless, tinged with the hopelessness of a man walking the edge of a blade.

"Or you'll find out exactly how far I'm willing to go to keep you in line. And your brother won’t help you."

"Yeah, whatever," I mutter under my breath. A prayer. A curse. Logan McKenna, the bane of my existence, might just be the most attractive bastard I've ever laid eyes on.

Eyelids heavy as fuck, I rouse from a restless slumber the following morning. The remnants of last night's liquor and lunacy still cling to my consciousness like cobwebs in the corners of an abandoned house.

I'm sober now, but sobriety does nothing to cleanse the confusion that muddies my thoughts. The confusion that sparked yesterday in the loo of my brother’s place of work during my drunken confrontation with Logan. Well, I could be exaggerating. It wasn’t a confrontation. It was more of a situation where he yelled at me like a parent whose fuse was blown and I was just a disobedient child, ogling him, counting his bloody lashes, and checking out his scar.

I roll in my bed and toss the pillow away. It slips to the floor with barely a sound. Curiosity gnaws at me with sharp little teeth. I can't shake off the image of Logan—his scarred temple, the mercury-gray eyes, the tattoos tracing his skin like battle maps.

It’s frustrating.

I’m hungry and hungover, I realize. I have no choice but to get out of bed. I know he’ll be there. Sitting in the living room, waiting to see where I want to go today or what trouble I’ll get into.

I don’t want to see him.

Still, I shuffle downstairs, each step an echo in the hollow quietude of the late morning. The grandeur of Vlad's mansion is lost on me, my focus tunneling in on the sofa below where he’s usually reading his newspaper. And there he is—Logan, the man who split my world into a before and an after with nothing but a gaze.

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