Page 43 of A Lesson in Thorns (Thornchapel 1)
Saint breaks our kiss, our faces still so close that our noses nearly touch, and he blinks a few times, as if he’s not sure where he is or what he?
??s doing. I try to pull him back, I want more, more, more, but he sets me down and takes a big step back, his hands balled into fists and his expression anguished. When he meets my confused stare, he looks at me like I’ve accused him of something.
But I haven’t, I’m not, I don’t understand—
“This can’t—” his voice breaks and he looks away, swallowing. “This can’t happen. We can’t happen. Do you understand?”
“No, I don’t fucking understand,” I say, my not understanding slowly giving way to hurt, humiliated anger. “I don’t know what to think at all right now.”
He sucks his lower lip into his mouth, toying with the barbell. He looks miserable.
It would be so easy right now to whip him with my words and scourge him with all the bitter rejection I feel. And I want to, really want to, even though I’ve never been a whipper—never before St. Sebastian at least. I also want to plead, to coax, to chase him away from we can't happen.
I want him to be mine. Or I want to deny him the right to ever call me his.
I want to heal him and I want to hurt him.
All because of one broken kiss.
I take a deep breath, I remember who I want to be. That I want to believe the best of people, that I want to be honest and resilient—not someone who doesn’t listen, not some discourteous, feral sub girl who lashes out with hurt pride.
And if that’s who I want to be, then I owe Saint what he’s asked for. My understanding.
“I like you,” I say finally. “I like you a lot. Not just because we were kids once, but because I’m intrigued by the man you are now. I’m . . . I don’t even know how to describe it without sounding trite, but I’m drawn to you, St. Sebastian. I’m coded to you somehow, like every part of me just responds to every part of you. But it’s okay if it’s not reciprocated, if you don’t feel the same way, because sometimes that’s just what happens, and I promise to honor that.”
Saint looks angry and pained at turns—he pivots to face the far end of the hall, like he needs to see something other than me while he thinks, and then he pivots back. “It’s reciprocated, Proserpina,” he says in a low, tight voice. “It’s very, very reciprocated. But there are other things to consider. Auden—”
“—is not going to fire me,” I interrupt, completely and utterly done with this excuse. “I know you’ve had your differences, but that’s not something he’d do.”
Saint’s voice is still tight when he says, “There’s more to Auden than you think. He can be incredibly cruel when he likes.”
“Is that truly it? You’re worried I’ll be fired if we fuck?”
Saint winces at that word. “Poe.”
I study his face, and suddenly I get the creeping feeling that there’s more, that there’s something else. “What aren’t you telling me?” I ask. “What aren’t you saying?”
Saint takes so long to answer that it’s almost its own answer. I rest my head back against the cold door with a sudden wave of exhaustion.
The sleet that had blown in earlier is now melting around my tights-covered feet into a frigid pool of wet.
“It’s complicated,” he tells me. “And I am reasonably certain you wouldn’t believe me even if I did tell you, because I don’t even believe it myself. Not really.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I ask.
He pushes his palms into his eyes. “Nothing,” he mumbles through his hands. “It doesn’t mean anything.”
“This is bullshit,” I say, any nice and understanding words turning sour in my mouth. “You won’t kiss me because of a reason you won’t tell me and that you don’t even believe yourself? You know, all you had to say was ‘Poe, I don’t want to kiss you.’ You don’t have to make fools out of us both to make sure we don’t do it again.”
His hands drop away from his face, his eyes blazing with an inky heat. “Jesus fucking Christ, Poe! What about that kiss would make you think I wouldn’t want to do it again?”
“I don’t know!” I shout back, fully aware that I’ve abandoned all my good intentions not to be the feral sub girl, but I can’t help it. None of this makes sense, none of it, and I may not deserve much, but I at least deserve the truth. Or even a better fucking lie. “I don’t know what to think at all!”
His lips press together in a bloodless, angry line, and he slams his hand against the door by my head. Just like he did earlier when we were kissing, except this time when he ducks his head low, it’s not to touch mouths but to utter low, acid words.
“You want to know so fucking badly? Fine. The entire village of Thorncombe thinks that you should marry Auden. Auden’s father wanted you to marry Auden. Everybody in this goddamn place thinks you should marry Auden, except Delphine.”
And Auden himself.
