Page 142 of Dustwalker

No, he was preoccupied with the fact that since Lara had awoken from her laudanum-induced sleep several hours ago, she hadn’t said a word to him.

He brushed aside the curtain and entered the small space. Lara lay on the bed, right arm outside the blanket and resting at her side, left tucked snugly in its sling, with her head turned away. Was she sleeping?

Stepping closer to the bed, Ronin set the tray on the nearby cart and looked down at her.

Lara’s eyes were open, and she was staring at the side curtain. She didn’t look his way, didn’t acknowledge his presence, didn’t speak.

“I brought you something to eat.”

Silence.

Brow plates drawing low, he covered her hand with his. “Lara?”

She immediately yanked her hand out from beneath his and rested it on her stomach.

An unpleasant sensation skittered through his circuitry, the same one he’d felt when she’d withdrawn from him yesterday. He lifted his hand, fingers curling into a fist, and struggled to understand what he was feeling.

There was hurt, yes, not just from what she’d done but from the knowledge that he’d caused this. It was made worse because all the pieces were here before him, but he couldn’t quite see how they fit together. Couldn’t quite trace the causes and effects that had led to this.

“Lara?”

Silence.

Ronin moved to the other side of the bed, but Lara simply turned her face away from him again.

“Lara, please.” He grasped her chin and gently turned her head toward him. “Speak to me.”

Finally, her blue eyes, bright against the bruises around them, met his. She whipped her chin from his grasp. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

He struggled to isolate his pain, to purge it from his system. This was about what she felt. That was what he needed to know, needed to understand. “Why?”

“Because youhurtme, Ronin.”

Ronin recoiled at those words, pulling back his hand. Electricity buzzed through him, distorting his sensory inputs and his processes, jolting his entire system. All he wanted was to protect her. Causing her harm, even inadvertently, felt like it clashed with every line of code in his programming.

“The laudanum,” he said, his vocal modulator crackling softly.

Moisture gathered in her eyes, and she pressed her lips together, once more turning her face away from him.

He knew he was right, but only partially. There was more to this, more he couldn’t see, couldn’t comprehend. Lara’s anger was usually open and fiery. She didn’t hide it, didn’t shy away from expressing it. She’d never been afraid to speak her mind to him, even in anger. But this anger was…different. It was laced with hurt, hurt that he’d caused.

When he caught her chin this time, he didn’t let her pull away, forcing her to keep her eyes locked with his. “Speak to me, Lara. Yell at me. Scream at me, curse at me, hit me. Anything but…this.”

Ronin stroked her jaw with his thumb as he watched a tear spill from the corner of her eye and slide into her hair. “Do not close yourself off to me.”

“You took my choice away,” she said, voice raw.

Every part within him stilled. “Lara…”

“What you did… It was a betrayal. I know you did it because you wanted to help me, but it was my choice, Ronin. Mine.” More tears fell from her eyes. “And you took it from me. You held me down while they forced a drug into my mouth that you knew I didn’t want. They treated me like I was crazy, and you… I…I never thought you’d…”

Her face crumpled, and her next words came out between her sobs. “You’re supposed to be on my side, supporting me.”

That unsettling feeling permeated Ronin now, a thousand times stronger than before.

For all his thoughts of her, he’d failed to consider what she wanted, what was most important to her. Instead, he’d decided what was best for her. That single thoughtless act had broken something precious to him—Lara’s trust.

“Lara, I…”