Page 109 of Freed
I shrug, ignoring the pull in my side. “Sorry, my dude. It’s a done deal. You’re Dave to me until you can respect my boundaries and call me Birdie like everyone else.”
For one suspended second, he just looks at me. Then he laughs. It’s entirely without humor.
“Careful,” he says softly. “I’m in no mood tonight.”
“Then stop giving me material, Dave.”
He moves so fast my breath catches.
One moment he’s standing at the end of the bed, and the next he’s braced one hand beside my hip, leaning down just enough to make the air between us feel charged. He’s not touching me, but he’s enough that I can see the dark storm in his eyes and the control stretched razor-thin over it.
“I amnotDave.”
“Mm.” I tilt my head. “You have the same fragile male ego, so I’m not seeing the difference.”
“You want to provoke me because you’re frightened.”
I hold his gaze. “I want to provoke you because you’re insufferable, Dave.”
“No,” he says quietly. “You want to provoke me because if I’m angry, I’m easier to read.”
That lands too close to the truth and I look away first.
“I told you,” I say, forcing my voice steady, “if you know something, you need to tell me.”
“And I told you no.”
“Because you don’t trust me.”
His stare doesn’t waver. “Should I?”
The question hangs between us. How can he still not trust me? After everything we’ve been through together…
I swallow. “I didn’t poison myself.”
“No.” His voice drops, roughening at the edges. “You didn’t.”
It should make me feel better.
Instead, it just makes my chest ache.
“Then who?”
His fingers curl once against the mattress. “Someone who now has my full attention.”
There’s something terrible in the way he says it. Something final. My hand slides protectively to my stomach. His gaze drops there immediately, and the room changes all over again.
When he looks back at me, his expression is unreadable.
“Rest, Birdie,” he says.
My eyes widen. There it is. He called me Birdie.
The traitor pulse in my throat jumps. Then I narrow my eyes. “That doesn’t count.”
One dark brow arches. “No?”
“No. You said it under duress.”
