Page 30 of Entity

What I don’t say aloud is that I don’t like the idea of Eros turning himself off down here alone, abandoned, unwanted. The thought makes me sick to my stomach. Ialsodon’t say that I’m desperate to see Orpheus again. Even if Ian is still conscious after all that whiskey, he can’t possibly miss me for a few minutes if I stop by Orpheus’s room.

Eros smiles, but something about the expression feels off. “Very well, Kit.”

It takes everything in me not to stare at Orpheus’s door as we pass. When we get to Eros’s room, he types in the key code again. He opens the door, then turns back to me.

I startle at his expression.

His eyes are dark, his full lips drawn together. Tension radiates from him. I’ve never seen him like this before. His golden radiance is suddenly shadowed, twisted, malignant. I move to step away, but before I can, Eros reaches out lightning-fast to grab my upper arm. His grip is impossibly tight. I’m frozen in momentary shock, adrenaline spiking.

“Eros?” I manage. “What’s wrong?”

“Don’t trust him.” He speaks through gritted teeth as if each word inflicts pain.

“Who?” My skin crawls. His hold on me starts to hurt; he’s going to leave a bruise.

Eros’s eyes widen, his lips curling back to reveal teeth bared in a grimace of pain. He looks wild beneath the fluorescent lights, a feral creature trapped in a cage. Suddenly, I’m afraid — not of this unnamed threat but of Eros himself. I remember how easily he lifted me onto his hard cock. He could kill me in countless ways with almost no effort.

“Don’t trust him,” Eros repeats.

“Don’t fucking trustwho?” I splutter, my voice high-pitched.

A tear slides down Eros’s stricken, pain-contorted face. “Don’t. Don’t.”

“Eros, please, are you…”

But as I try to form coherent words, Eros’s grip on me slackens. His arm drops. His expression falls neutral like a switch flipping. Then he tilts his head. “I’m sorry, Kit. I think I was distracted. Did you say something?”

I stare back, dumbfounded. My skin prickles with fear, and I swallow dryly. Whatever the fuck just happened, I want nothing to do with it. I want out of this vault. “Nope. Didn’t say anything.”

Eros smiles. “Good. Have a lovely night, Kit Fox.”

He crosses to the circular dais, bends over, and presses the back of his own heel. By the time he’s in his proper pose, his expression is lifeless.

I close the door, taking care not to slam it. I lean my back against it for a few seconds, trying to catch my breath. I don’t have to ask Eros who he was talking about. I was up there this morning. I saw the bitterness, the harsh looks, the cruelty that laced his words when he spoke about Eros.

Don’t trust him.

He has to be talking about Ian.

12

I hoverat the top of the stairs, my hand pressed to the door that will open into Ian’s penthouse. If he’s in there, I have to act normal. I spent the whole walk upstairs trying to convince myself that Eros malfunctioned, that he said something else. But I’m not sure I am.

Whatever Eros meant, I don’t think Ian is a danger to me. No matter what he says when he’s sober, Ian’s behavior this morning made something very clear: he isn’t kind to Eros. He locked him in a vault, seemingly indefinitely, because he couldn’t carry a conversation the way Ian wanted him to. And now, I assume, he’s taking it out on me.

But he wouldn’t hurt me. His lawyer knows I’m here. My phone can be tracked. He’s just a volatile, bitter alcoholic.

I open the door slowly, heart in my throat.

The living area is empty. Shoulders slumping in relief, I close the door behind me and scan the room. No Ian. Just the rain endlessly drumming the windows.

“Thank fuck,” I breathe, heading straight for the bar. I could use that whiskey after all. But as I’m reaching for the bottle, something stops me. A strange, muffled sound. At first, I thinkit’s nothing, maybe the wind howling. I curl my fingers around the bottle.

I hear it again, louder this time — a low, drawn-out groan that crescendos slowly until it’s a hoarse sort of wail. Not this shit again. The sound is barely loud enough to hear above the rain and my own heartbeat, but I’m sure I’m not imagining it. And it’s coming from the hallway I haven’t been down. It’s coming from Ian’s room.

That fucking does it. I grab the whiskey bottle, spin on my heel, and run for the spiral staircase. I scamper up the metal stairs and rush into my guest room, slamming the door behind me and locking it. Without pausing to catch my breath, I dive into bed — whiskey still in my arms — and pull the covers over me.

I lie curled up under the blankets in a fetal position, breathing hard. It’s what I used to do as a kid when I was scared, when I needed to be alone. I’d curl up under the covers and close my eyes, and the rest of the world would fade away. But I still hear the rain outside, lashing these impossibly high windows.

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