Page 36 of Cruel Kiss

No, I'm mad at the other thing.

I'm mad that he stopped.

Or, more accurately, that he keeps stopping. No matter how hard I push him, he will not fight me for it. He will not give me the argument I could actually win. I keep building him a villain costume, holding it out, saying,Here, put this on, be Todd, be the man who takes and lies and pushes and decides.

And what does he do? He keeps folding it up and handing it back to me and saying,No, you're right, I know, that was wrong of me,until I'm the one standing there holding all the outrage with nowhere to put it.

A man is supposed to push.

Isn't that what defines the whole species?

I guess not. Because Ronan just waits.

He waits with that terrible patience of his, down the hall, in a guest room with a bed too small for him. I know for a fact he's not sleeping either, because I can't hear him. The silence coming from down the hall is the silence of a man lying flat on his back with his eyes open. I would pay dearly to know exactly what thoughts are occupying his mind.

I decide to think about other things. Harmless things. Things like…

Oh, I don't know.

How aboutslutty little reading glasses?

That's totally safe territory, right?

Spoiler: Not even a little bit.

I don't even know what it is about them that does something to me. Why is something so innocent soextremely not fucking innocent?

It's the contrast, I think. The mob boss in the dark hallway with the gun and the growl and thekotyonokis one man. The one who slides on those thin black frames at breakfast and squints at legal documents is another. And my backstabbing brain keeps trying to reconcile them and failing, and the failure comes out as?—

Well. As whateverthisis.

I flip onto my stomach, punch my pillow into a shape that better represents my rage, then flip back over.

The thing is, I know exactly what would fix this. It's one door down the hall. It—he—is lying flat on its back with its eyes open, being infuriatingly principled.

I could get up. I could walk down there and say something likethe branch situation requires further discussionand we could both pretend that's a perfectly plausible excuse.

But it would bemychoice to do it. The whole thing would fall on my shoulders.

I'm not so sure I'm ready for that.

I have to find some reasonable outlet, though, because this much steam built up within one woman is a recipe for disaster. As it turns out, the glasses are both the way into this messandthe way out.

Because once I let the glasses in, the rest of him comes pouring through, and there's no stopping it.

I'm not planning my next move. My hand just sort of migrates south under the covers, and by the time I notice what it's doing, it's already too late to pretend I have any intention of stopping.

Fine,I tell the ceiling.If I can't sleep, I might as well.

It's just physiology. Nothing to do with Ronan Akov. Nothing at all.

I close my eyes.

In my head, he's got the glasses on. And those sweatpants again. He's kneeling at the foot of my bed like he's got all the time in the world, more patient than ever, probably because he knows that pisses me off.

Come here,dream-Ronan says. He crooks one finger.Scoot to the edge for me.

In the fantasy, I don't argue. That's how I know it's a fantasy, because in real life, I'd tell him to go to hell.