Hold Me Close - Talia Hibbert Page 0,265

deadly weapons. Finally, he shot her a look. Well? I stopped.

Her answering expression was all amusement. The sight soothed him. If she could tease with nothing but the glint in those dark eyes, she couldn’t be too upset. And if she wasn’t too upset, he wouldn’t have to sneak into Ed and Mark’s room tonight for a bit of mild decapitation.

Still, he caught her hand in his, because that’s what a boyfriend would do—touch her, ground her, make sure she was okay. Only, the moment he did it, his mind went blank. Palm against palm, fingers intertwining, hers long and fine and delicate. For no reason he could discern, it just… it fucked him up. Everything about him glitched. Like she was a plug socket and he’d just been shocked. Bright heat, a thrill of sensation, a slight jump to his heart, and he was staring down at her like he’d never seen her before.

Had he ever seen her before? She looked different, somehow.

Oh. The change must have something to do with her anger. She’d told him to calm down, but he saw what she was trying to hide: Rae was furious, calculating, and magnificent. Her smile was a bite. Her voice was a knife. She turned to the brothers and said matter-of-factly, “I was in a bar fight.”

The two men leaned back a little, as if shoved by surprise. “A bar fight?” Ed echoed faintly.

“Yes. A strange man made an unwanted, unnecessary and intrusive comment about my appearance, so I hit him over the head with a chair.” Rae shrugged, rolling her eyes in a What am I like? gesture of self-deprecation. “It’s all a bit of a blur from there.”

Zach bit down on the inside of his cheek to stop from laughing. The brothers looked slightly stunned, then slowly irritated. They shared a grim look, and Ed said coldly, “Very funny. There’s no need to get snippy.”

“I know.” Rae gave them a brilliant, one-sided smile. “But I so enjoy it.”

With twin scowls and spluttering, disapproving huffs, they swept away.

“Oh, dear,” Rae said, utterly serene. “We lost the lift.” She shook her head and pressed the button to call another. Zach tried not to bubble over with laughter or admiration. It wasn’t easy.

The elevator arrived with impressive speed, a sparkling, mirrored box made up of reflections. He got in and was treated to a thousand different angles of Rae’s smile, a slight, smug tilt of the lips. She was pleased with herself, and he liked it. Something powerful crackled in her gaze, like a bonfire dancing in the dark.

It made him smile, too. “You know what that was?” he asked.

She raised her eyebrows in question as the chrome doors slid shut. “What?”

“That was Ravenswood Rae out in the wild.”

Her eyes crinkled at the corners as she grinned. “Hmm. It was, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, yeah.” You don’t need me at all, you know. But he was glad to be there, anyway. Then a thought occurred to him, souring his mood. “Do you get questions like that a lot?”

“Of course I do.” She said it mildly, but her pleasure dimmed a little, her gaze shuttering.

He was pissed all over again, but for once, the emotion didn’t feel dangerous. He didn’t want to pour it, bruised and bitter, into manual labour, or to cut it off cold. He remembered the touch of Rae’s hand against his back, the care and trust and connection in that simple movement, and he felt… balanced. Released from expectation. Like he didn’t have to chain up his negative emotions and leave them in the dark just to keep her by his side.

He breathed in her sugar-and-lemon scent and let the anger pass.

Then he said, “That’s fucked up.”

“Yes. But it helps me figure out who’s worth befriending and who I should write off immediately. I appreciate the efficiency of it all.” She paused, turning to look at him. Her eyes were so intense, like whole worlds existed there in the dark. “You’ve never asked me about them.”

Her scars. “If you wanted to tell me, you probably would. If it was important, you definitely would.”

“No,” she said lightly. “I mean, it’s not important at all. But I never tell people important things, anyway. I don’t know how.”

Nothing about her expression said she was hurting, but suddenly, he felt sure that she was—and he didn’t like it. So, he raised a hand, and when she didn’t pull away, he cupped her face. He was glad the awkwardness between them had faded