had happened with Christian. "And I don't know what he meant. Does he want to break up? Will he come talk to me later? Should I go to him?" Lissa buried her face in her hands.
"Oh God. You don't think there's anything going on with him and Jill, do you?"
"Jailbait? No," exclaimed Avery. "Of course not. Look, you need to calm down. You're freaking me out. This is going to be okay." Anxiety lined Avery's face, and she went to get Lissa a glass of water. Then, reconsidering, she poured a glass of wine instead.
Sitting alone, Lissa felt her wild emotions torment her. She hated what she'd done. She felt like there was something wrong with her. First she'd alienated me, and now Christian. Why couldn't she keep her friends? What did it take? Was she really going crazy? She felt out of control and desperate. And she Bam!
Suddenly, and without warning, I was shoved out of Lissa's head.
Her thoughts disappeared completely. I'd neither left of my own choice, nor had I been snapped back because of something in my own body. I stood in the room alone, having come to a standstill while pacing and thinking. Never, never had anything like that happened to me. This had been like... well, like a physical force. Like a glass wall or force field slamming down in front of me and pushing me back. It had been an outside power. It hadn't come from me.
But what was it? Had it been Lissa? To my knowledge, she'd never been able to feel me in her head. Had that changed? Had she kicked me out?
Had her spinning feelings grown so strong that there was no room for me?
I didn't know, and I didn't like any of it. When it had happened, aside from the sensation of being pushed, I'd experienced another strange feeling.
It was like a fluttering, as if someone had reached in and tickled my mind. I'd had brief warm and cold flashes, and then it had all stopped once I was out of her head. It had felt invasive.
And it had also felt... familiar.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Unfortunately, I couldn't remember where I'd felt it before.
Considering everything else that had been happening to me, the fact that I'd even recalled it at all was remarkable. My memories were a little scattered, but I did my best to sift through them, wondering where I had experienced that tickling in my brain. I received no answers, and pondering it all soon became as frustrating as coming up with an escape plan.
And as more time passed, I realized I really did need an escape plan. The endorphin withdrawal was killing me, but I was thinking more and more clearly as the effects left my system. I was astonished at how out of it I'd let myself become. As soon as I'd allowed Dimitri to bite me... I'd fallen apart. I'd lost my higher reasoning. I'd lost my strength and skills. I'd become soft and silly and stupid. Well, not entirely. If I'd completely lost it, I'd be a Strigoi now. There was some comfort, at least, in knowing that even while high on bites, some part of me had still fought through and refused to succumb.
Knowing I wasn't as entirely weak as I'd believed helped keep me going. It made it easier to ignore the yearning in my body, to distract myself with bad TV and eating all the food in the little refrigerator. I even stayed awake for a long time in the hopes of exhausting myself. It worked, and I crashed as soon as I hit the pillow, drifting into a dreamless sleep with no withdrawal effects.
I was awakened later when a body slid into bed beside me. I opened my eyes and stared right into Dimitri's red ones. For the first time in days, I looked at him with fear, not love. I kept that off my face, though, and smiled at him. I reached out and touched his face.
"You're back. I missed you."
He caught my hand and kissed my palm. "I had things to do."
The shadows shifted on his face, and I caught the tiniest glimpse of dried blood near his mouth. Grimacing, I rubbed it off with my finger. "So I see."
"It's the natural order, Rose. How are you feeling?"
"Better. Except..."
"What?"
I looked away, conflicted again. The look in his eyes just then was more than simple curiosity. There was concern there-only a little-but it was there. Concern for me. And yet only