Page 104 of Endgame
The fire in his expression isn’t there. In its place, there’s confusion.
A crease between his eyebrows. A myriad of questions on his face.
“That, and let me have this room.” He hasn’t refused me yet. I have to try, have to keep fighting him, as risky as it is. “Let me spend time here. Don’t lock it up.”
“Repeat that for me.”
“I’m asking you to keep this room unlocked.”
“Not that,” he snaps, pressing tighter against me.
Now it’s my turn to be confused. “I want to work?”
The creases on his forehead deepen.
He says nothing.
“I won’t pry. I won’t look at your pictures.” I slide my gaze to the collage on my side. Back to Everett. “I’m desperate to read, I’m lonely. You won’t talk to me. You hardly come near me. At the very least, you could let me read. Let me be here when you don’t…”
“When I don’t fuck you.”
“Yes.” My thighs clench without my permission. The shameful need for friction is eating me alive.
“Okay,” he says.
“You can’t do this to me.” I launch into an argument I’d always lose with my parents. They’d flip the lock, and that was that. “I have the right to get a job. For fuck’s sake, I’m a human being. I should be able to get out of this house. I should be allowed to read something other than math textbooks or?—”
“Aurora.” My body is thrust harder into the bookshelves.
Everett presses his thumb beneath my chin, tilting my head up. Staring down at me.
The shift in him is so small, but it takes my breath away.
“I said okay.” He makes me gasp, the bastard. Makes my heart flutter. “You can work and spend time here, in this room. The photo collage is off-limits. The whole corner over there is. Other than that, fine. I won’t lock it up.”
The need to hug him is explosive. My arms itch to fold around him.
I go up and down on my tiptoes, readying myself to jump at him.
And stop myself. I’ve been around controlling assholes for the past twenty-two years. There’s a caveat somewhere. There’s always a caveat.
“So.” I flatten both hands on the books behind me, steeling my heart against more pain. “Do I still start tomorrow?”
“Yes, though it won’t be a real job.”
My eyebrows shoot down.
“I said a commitment. A commitment you’ll treat as a job,” he speaks up before I have a chance to slip in a word, before I argue. “A driver will take you there five days a week, six hours each day. You’ll do it voluntarily, this commitment that I’ve chosen for you. Just this one. It’s not up for discussion.”
“I’ll go. Every day, I swear.” Getting paid isn’t the issue. Meeting new people, socializing, evolving as a person…it’s the dream. “Where is it?”
“At the nearest hospital.” An evil glint shimmers in his eyes. He’s no longer compassionate or mad.
He’s pleased.
Strange.
I mean, this is good. Helping people. I can get behind that. Scratch that, I’m fucking pumped. What isn’t he telling me?
