Page 77 of Roguefinder

“You had hours,” I said, hating the burn in my throat.

Regret swam in his eyes. “I didn’t want to rattle you before we walked into Carlo’s. I was going to tell you after.”

“Were you?”

He leaned forward. “Yes, Caleb. I swear⁠—”

“Like you swore in France that you’d never lie to me again?” I looked at his notebooks and row of pens. The notes and theories—all evidence of his careful, methodical mind. He’d left me in bed before dawn so he could work.

Before I could get in the way.

I shoved back my chair and stood.

Jesse was on his feet before the legs finished scraping. “Where are you going?”

“Out.”

I strode from the kitchen. He was right behind me as I hit the stairs.

I took them two at a time, stalked to the bedroom, and went to the closet. I grabbed the first clothes I saw, yanking a sweatshirt over my head and stabbing my legs into jeans I scooped off the floor. When I returned to the bedroom, Jesse filled the doorway. His eyes had lightened to champagne, and his jaw was as hard as the marble in the foyer.

“Caleb.”

“I don’t want to talk to you right now,” I said, swiping my wallet from the nightstand.

“You can’t walk around Rome alone.”

I shoved the wallet into my back pocket. “Are you going to stop me?”

The challenge landed like a gauntlet between us. Stupid on my part, but what the fuck did it matter? Smart or stupid, he’d treat me the same. I was a liability for him to manage.

“Don’t make this something it isn’t,” he said softly.

“Get out of my way.”

Something flickered in his eyes. “You don’t know Rome. You don’t speak Italian. Please don’t leave like this.”

I moved toward him. He squared his shoulders, filling the frame and blocking my path.

My heart kicked into overdrive, the beats pounding between my ears. The night we’d met, he’d knocked me out before I could kill Dean Welch. He’d restrained me when I couldn’t handle what I was becoming.

But since then, he’d never put his hands on me unless I wanted it. Not once. He was careful to a fault with safewords and consent. But he was from another time. Another era. He’d lived decades longer, collecting gifts from Sterling and power I couldn’t dream of. I knew almost nothing about magic, but I knew about powerful people. They used it to get the things they wanted and then told themselves they’d done it for the right reasons.

It was for your own good.

We had to.

You’ll understand one day.

I stabbed a finger toward the bed. “I let you own my ass there,” I said, my voice surprising me with its steadiness. “I let you. Understand? But you don’t own it anywhere else. You don’t get to decide what I can handle or how much information I deserve, and you sure as shit don’t get to tell me where I can go.”

Hurt flickered in his eyes. But how could I believe it?

He stepped aside.

I brushed past him and went to the stairs with my pulse jackhammering my throat. When his footfalls echoed behind me, relief hit so hard and fast that I almost missed a step.

Which was pathetic. I knew that. My insides shouldn’t have turned loose and shaky just from him refusing to leave me alone. I shouldn’t have kept an eye on him in my peripheral vision as I shoved my feet into my shoes. I shouldn’t have cared when he slipped his on, too, or when he followed me out of the house. But no one had ever followed me before.