Page 35 of Wicked Chains
I check my phone. 2:17 AM. I roll onto my back and stare at the ceiling, knowing it’s going to be a long night.
I can't stop thinking about that moment with Lucien. The way his lips felt against mine, the hunger in his eyes before he pulled away.
And beneath all that, the constant, gnawing worry about Drake. Where is he? Why did he disappear? Is he avoiding me on purpose?
"Damn it," I mutter, kicking off the covers and sitting up. My tank top is all twisted around my torso, and my sleep shorts have ridden up uncomfortably. I straighten my clothes with angry tugs, mad at the world tonight.
I’m about to get up and get a glass of water when the air in the room shifts subtly. A barely perceptible drop in temperature that makes the hair on my arms stand up. I stop, suddenly alert, eyes searching the darkness.
“Drake?” I whisper.
"I’m here."
My heart skips painfully as his familiar form materializes at the foot of my bed. Drake stands there, hands in the pockets of his ghostly trousers, hair falling across his forehead in that way that usually makes my stomach do flips. Tonight, it just makes me angry.
"Where the hell have you been?" I demand, keeping my voice quiet despite my rising temper.
Drake's expression is unreadable. "Around."
"Around?" I repeat incredulously. "That's all you have to say? You vanish for days, then just show up in my bedroom at two in the morning with 'around'?"
He moves closer, perching on the edge of my bed. "It wasn't that long," he says.
"Seriously? After everything that's happened, you just disappeared. I thought Ash banished you again!" Which is true. I did think that. But what I don’t say is that I was worried that he leftme. That he didn’t want me.
"I'm here now," he says, reaching for my hand.
I pull back before he can touch me. "That's not good enough. Where were you? What happened?"
A look crosses over him before his expression returns to his normal, slightly melancholy face. "It doesn't matter. I'm back."
"It matters to me," I insist.
"It was nothing. No big deal."
I slide farther back on the bed, putting distance between us. "You're lying to me. I can tell."
"Rose—"
"No. Don't 'Rose' me like I'm being unreasonable. You've been acting weird ever since I brought you back. Something's wrong, and you're not telling me."
"Not everything is your problem to solve."
"When it involves you leaving me without a word, without a warning? Yeah, it kind of is my problem."
Drake's eyes flash with genuine hurt. "You think I'm abandoning you on purpose? That I'd choose to be away from you?"
"I don't know what to think because you won't tell me the truth!"
"The truth is complicated," he says, voice rising to match mine.
"Then un-complicate it!"
"I can't!" He stands abruptly, pacing at the foot of my bed. "It's not that simple."
"Try me," I challenge him. "I'm pretty good with complicated these days."
Drake stops pacing and looks at me, really looks at me, for what feels like the first time since he appeared. "What do you want me to say, Rose? That I might not—" He cuts himself off.
