Page 77 of Twisted Steel

Her expression shifts.Anger pauses for fear, and I hate being the one to put it there.

“He’ll know?”she asks.

“If he doesn’t already, he will soon.”

“How?”

“People talk.”

Her face flushes, but not only with embarrassment.Fury too.“So now what?I get locked in a tower because you and I crossed a line?”

“No.”

“Good.”

“But you do need to stay close.”

Her eyes flash.“That sounds tower-adjacent.”

I drag a hand over my head, fighting the urge to reach for her.“I’m trying to keep you breathing.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

“Yes,” she snaps.Then softer, “I also know breathing isn’t the same as living.”

I look away first.The room is too small for this.Too full of her.Her clothes on my floor.Her scent in my bed.Her words asking for parts of me I don’t know how to hand over without putting her in danger.

Her hand comes to my jaw.Light and careful.A medic’s touch on a killer’s face.

“Look at me,” she says, and I do.

Big.Fucking.Mistake.

Her eyes are too clear for morning.Too honest for a room that still smells like sex and smoke and every bad decision I would make again if she asked.

“I chose last night,” she says.

“I know.”

“No.You know it up here.”She taps two fingers against my temple.“I need you to know it everywhere else.I chose your mouth.Your hands.Your bed.I chose you, Steel.Don’t cheapen that by turning it into another threat assessment.”

My chest tightens until breathing takes work.“I don’t know how to separate them,” I admit.

Her thumb brushes the corner of my mouth.“Then learn.”

The order should piss me off.Instead, it goes straight through me.

I catch her wrist, but I don’t hold it tight.“If you keep saying things like that, I’m going to want to keep you here.”

Her eyes darken.“You already want that,” she challenges.

“Yes.”I won’t lie to her.

“And yet you’re still sitting there pretending you’re the reasonable one.”

“I am reasonable.”