Page 56 of Teach Me to Fly

My throat tightens as I consider how to answer him. I don’t want to lie, not to him, so I choose not to say anything at all.

He turns his head, eyes finding mine again. “The knife,” he says, carefully. “Last night, when I held it under your chin you leaned into it instead of flinching away.”

I feel the heat rush back into my face, but this time it’s a slow burn that coils lower in my stomach.

“It turned you on, right?”

Shame and desire war inside me, spiralling into each other, feeding off each other. I want to run, but I also want to stay.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” I whisper.

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he says firmly, his thumb strokes coming to a stop. “Pain can be a release.”

I look away and close my eyes. “It just… it helps me take back control.”

“Because it was taken from you?”

I don’t answer when I realize that I’ve already said too much. Reign shifts, letting go of my wrist and cupping my jaw instead, tilting my face back up to his. When I meet his eyes, there’s no disgust there, or pity, just understanding.

“There’s nothing wrong with having a pain kink, Angel,” he says quietly. “And there’s nothing wrong with wanting to feel in control of your body.”

He gently brushes his thumb across my cheek, then over my bottom lip, dragging it down softly.

“You don’t have to hurt yourself in secret, and you don’t have to punish yourself, either. If pain helps, then let’s figure out asafe way to use it.”

I tense slightly, but I don’t pull away. “You’re saying you’d… help me with that?”

“If you let me.” His voice stays steady, and he lets the words hang in the space between us.

“What the actual fuck is going on here?” Lando says from behind me, interrupting the moment.

I shriek, startled, and curl my body into Reign instinctively. He tightens his grip on me as he looks over my head to find Lando standing in the doorway, wide-eyed and breathing like he just sprinted across the estate.

“Oh, it’s you.”

Reign drops his head back onto his pillow and I turn around to face Lando, Reign’s arm still wrapped around my middle. His eyes bounce between me and Reign, and the fact that I’m tucked against his chest like this is completely normal for us.

“Lando—”

“Oh my God, Angelique,” he gasps, interrupting me. “Are you naked under there?”

“What?” I shriek, glancing down at the bare part of my leg that's sticking out from under the sheets. “Of course not!”

“Lando,” Reign says calmly. “Close the door and wait for us in the living room.”

“Absolutely not.” He storms further into the room. “I leave for one night, and I come back to see that my best friend has answered none of my texts from last night. So of course I call her, and of course she doesn’t answer a single time, which sends me into a panic.”

“I’m so sorry, I was?—”

“So, what do I do?” Lando continues, cutting me off again. “I race over here and instead of findingher fast asleep in her own bed, she’s wrapped up in bed with my brother, half-naked.”

Lando is livid, and he’s staring down Reign like he’s ready for a fist fight.

“I was sleepwalking,” I blurt. “And I woke up here instead of in my bed.”

I try to pull away from Reign, but he just tightens his grip again, keeping my back pressed against him as he continues to stare down his brother.

Lando returns the glare, just as threatening. “And let me guess, brother, you thought cuddling her to sleep was the solution? I thought I told you not to lead her on.”

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