Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 200837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1004(@200wpm)___ 803(@250wpm)___ 669(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 200837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1004(@200wpm)___ 803(@250wpm)___ 669(@300wpm)
But he doesn’t say anything. He just takes a step forward so I have to take a step back. And because this room is so small, I’m already bumping into the side of the bed.
A bed we share.
A bed where we sleep next to each other.
He takes another step and this time I can’t really do anything but sit.
I have a flash of panic here. It’s fleeting, but it’s real. Because this position—me sitting down and Tyse towering over me—it’s reminding me of the last time I was with Finn. And despite the fact that the sex felt good, it wasn’t good sex. It was… fear sex. It was desperate, and sad, and vulgar.
Tyse squints his eyes at me, like he’s reading something on my face. And immediately he bends down, placing his hands on my knees. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“You’re lying. We don’t have to—”
“That’s not it.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
“I’m thinking about Finn.”
He almost stands up again, but I put my hands over his to make him reconsider. Which he does. But he also spells it out for me. “I don’t wanna compete with that guy.”
“You’re not. He’s not even here.”
He taps a finger to my head. “I mean, in there. I don’t wanna compete with him in there.”
“Trust me, he’s not in there.”
“Then why are you thinking about him right now?”
“Because I just remembered that he was…” But I suddenly can’t say it out loud. Because I hadn’t even admitted this to myself before this very second, and it’s so hard to believe that I start to wonder if I just got it wrong.
Except I didn’t get it wrong and my eyes are filling up with tears, because I got it exactly right, and my heart is broken over this new awareness.
“He was what, Clara?”
“He was mean to me.”
“Mean to you how?”
Then I’m crying, and I feel stupid, and I don’t know what to say.
“Mean to you how, Clara?”
“He treated me like I was some down-city tavern whore. He wanted things… things I had never done before. But I did it. And still he didn’t save me. And he said things…” I let out a breath. “Forget it. The important part is that when I walked through the tower door, I hated him.” I look up and meet Tyse’s eyes. “I told him I would hate him ’till the end of time. He was someone else. Something happened to him after his father died.”
“When did his father die?”
“The day the bells rang for Haryet.”
“And you went in the day after Haryet.”
“Yeah.”
“Well, that’s all pretty stressful. Maybe he—”
“No.” I stop Tyse right there. Before he can defend Finn. Because it’s not true and I don’t want to hear it. “That’s not why. Yes, it was stressful. But the change in Finn was something else. It wasn’t stress, Tyse. It wasn’t. It was something else.”
Tyse stands back up and this time I don’t stop him. Then he takes off his jacket, hangs it up, then removes his weapon belt, draping it over the chair in the kitchen. And then takes off his shirt and walks over to the chair to take off his boots.
It’s a pattern with him that I’ve come to recognize.
I lean over, take off my boots too, and then grab a nightgown out of my little chest of drawers. It’s a lot like the one I wore last night. White. Cotton. Soft. Girly instead of sexy. And I feel very young in this moment. Like… immature. Which is not how I felt in the Maiden Tower. There, I always felt so grown up.
But I think it was an illusion. I don’t think I ever grew up. Not until I came here.
When I turn, Tyse has already taken his pants off and is standing in his boxers. But this is just how we sleep so I don’t know if we’re going to keep going, or this is just… sleep.
“What do you want to do?”
Did he just read my mind? “What do you mean?”
“You want me to… find the door and go kick his ass? Because I will.”
I just blink at him for a moment. “What?”
“That Finn fucker. I’m pissed. Can you tell?”
“Not really.”
“That’s how ya know I’m pissed. I’m a quiet kinda pissed. And after what you just told me, it’s my new mission in life—well, after tomorrow, which we are not gonna talk about tonight—but after tomorrow, it’s my new mission in life to find that fucker and make him pay. And by make him pay, I mean… in every dimension. Because I’m gonna hurt him in his soul.”
“Oh. Well… I was actually just wondering if we were gonna have sex tonight.”
His face goes blank. Then a small smile lifts up his lips. He chuckles. “OK, then. We’re gonna table the revenge scheme for a couple days and just concentrate on the sex. Acceptable?”