Page 59 of You Were Warned: Part One

“You don’t have to know.”

“I don’t?” The problem is that I think I need to know because my head is all messed up and I don’t like this at all. “What the fuck do you mean, I don’t?”

“You’ve known him for all of two minutes, Vesper. You don’t have to decide what it all means today.”

“That still leaves me with the issue about the Jester.”

“You don’t have to know the answer to that either.”

I groan and drop my forehead onto my folded arms where they rest on the counter. “This is why I don’t do feelings—they’re fucking inconvenient.”

Rue snorts. “They can be.”

“And what happens to this?” I say, lifting my head.

“This?” Rue asks.

I gesture between us. “You, me, this. I like this.”

“I know.”

“No, I mean I actually like it. I don’t want whatever is happening with the jingling psychopath to mean it has to stop. I don’t want to lose something I like because apparently my vagina and common sense are no longer on speaking terms, and my emotional unavailability has fucking expired.” Rue smiles, and I have to get through to him that I’m serious. “So what happens now?”

“Nothing, unless one of us wants something to change.”

I frown. “That’s it? And what if I like him?”

Rue shrugs. “If you like him, you like him.”

“And you don’t care?”

“I care if you’re safe, if you’re honest with me, and that whatever we’re doing is something everyone involved knows about.”

I stare at him. “But you don’t care if I sleep with him?”

“No.”

“Or Jensen?” I ask, pushing the boundaries a little to see if he’ll react, even just a bit, because nothing seems to bother this guy.

“Are you planning to?”

“I don’t fucking know. He wore a towel! Rue, that was enough to send me into an existential crisis. I am only so strong.”

He laughs again, and I’m glad one of us thinks this is funny.

“No, I don’t care. So long as they both know you’re also sleeping with me. I don’t like drama coming to my door, not unless it shows up wearing black, with sharp teeth and a vicious tongue.”

I poke my tongue out at him. “Why did you push me away earlier?”

“Because you didn’t come here because you wanted me.”

I frown, since I’m pretty sure I wanted him. “But I did.”

“You came here because you wanted to not think about someone else.”

Fuck, he’s right, and I hate that.

Rue walks around the counter and takes the stool beside me. “I don’t mind being casual—I like it that way.”