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And just like that, the spell was broken. For a minute I’d felt like my old self, but now Vaughn’s touch was too much. Too tight. Too restrictive.
I went to step away, but he held me tighter. “You don’t have to go. I give in to the power of your arms.” He was joking, good humor in his voice, matching the energy I’d been putting out there before he’d brought up my attack.
Only now, everything felt wrong. The room was too small, the walls closing in. Panic lit up inside me, coursing through my veins. I managed to get my hands up in between us and push hard on his chest. “No!”
He let go of me instantly, watching wide-eyed as I stumbled back toward the door. “Rebel, wait. What’s wrong?”
Tears pricked the backs of my eyes, mostly because of the look on his face. The regret. The confusion. It was all my fault, but I couldn’t say it. Couldn’t voice that in my head I was back there, locked in a room with men intent on hurting me.
I ran to my room and slid the latch on the door before getting in beneath the blankets. Outside, Vaughn called to me, and sometime later, he and Kian had a worried conversation about me not being ready to go back into the lion’s den that weekend.
But it was the complete opposite. I needed to go to this party. I needed to face my enemies head-on.
Because I wasn’t this scared little dormouse, too afraid of my own shadow to even function.
I needed to put an end to the panic. To the fear. I needed to face it. Stare it in the eye and tell it I was Rebel freaking Kemp.
And I would not be intimidated any longer.
* * *
I couldn’t sleep. I tossed and turned all night, exhausted, but sleep never came.
I was still awake when Kian and Vaughn both got up and showered. Kian knocked quietly on my door and asked if I was okay and did I need anything? I called back in a scratchy voice that I was fine on both counts.
“Call me if that changes, okay? I’m just putting it out there that you do not have to go to this thing tonight. No one will think you’re any less of a badass.”
I smiled into my pillow at that. Maybe that was true, but I would think less of me.
Vaughn didn’t come to my door before they left. I couldn’t blame him. After last night, I wouldn’t have either. I got up and got dressed, but my hands trembled the entire time.
I went into the bathroom to put some makeup on and stared at myself in the mirror. “Get it together. You aren’t a scared little girl. You’ve been through worse.”
I lifted my chin and pulled my shoulders back, but my damn traitorous hands wouldn’t stop. I needed a distraction. Pre-attack, I probably would have called Fang. He was the best at keeping my mind off my problems, with his lips and tongue and cock. But that wasn’t going to work today. He would be here later to go to the party with us, but until then I needed something to do to fill the hours, so I wasn’t constantly thinking about coming face-to-face with the men who’d attacked me.
I could clean, but Kian was a bit of a neat freak and took his duties seriously. Though I had no idea who was even paying him at the moment. I guessed it was Vaughn’s dad’s business. At least I hoped it was. I really didn’t want him picking up after me and Vaughn and scrubbing every surface of the house for free.
I wandered around the big empty kitchen and decided to bake something for when they got back. Maybe a ‘sorry for freaking out on you’ apology cake for Vaughn. I walked into the pantry and searched for a box of cake mix or something similar but came up empty-handed. Of course, because Kian was a great cook who had probably never baked a cake from a box. I trailed a finger along a shelf with four different types of flour and marveled that there were so many options. I didn’t even know there was anything other than all purpose flour.
But that was fine. I was resourceful. How hard could baking a cake be when I had the internet on my side?
With an online radio station blaring punk rock from the early two thousands and a recipe for carrot cake displayed on my phone, I started combining ingredients. Flour. Milk. Butter… They all went into a big mixing bowl, and I stirred them together, feeling like Martha freaking Stewart.
Eggs were next. I yanked open the refrigerator and pulled down the carton of eggs, only to find it suspiciously light. “Ugh,” I groaned to the empty kitchen. “Whyyyyy.”
That had to have been Vaughn, putting an empty container back in. Kian was too OCD about his kitchen. I called Kian.
He picked up on the first ring. “Hey! You’re on speaker in the car. Vaughn’s here. Did you think of something you need?”
“I’m baking a cake.”
“Uh, okay? Did you already burn it and want me to just buy one while we’re out?”
My mouth dropped open. “No, I did not burn it! You ass. You remember how little faith you had in me when you’re orgasming over how freaking good it tastes.”
He chuckled at my fiery, riled-up answer. “But there is a problem, right? Or else you wouldn’t have called.”
He had me there. “There’s no eggs.”