Page 81 of Let the Game Begin

“Oh yeah? You once peedmybed. On purpose!” he answered, narrowing his eyes.

“Well, you once cut my hair while I was sleeping. Are we going to talk about that?” I said, raising an eyebrow and already scenting victory on the wind. Logan smiled and shook his head at me, then he stared at an uncertain point on the wall, apparently lost in his own thoughts.

“I know you’re going to take Chloe to see Dr. Lively. Why don’t you…” He swallowed hard and skewered me with his hazel eyes. “Why don’t you go back to therapy, too?” he suggested cautiously, and a cold shiver ran down my spine, making me stiffen up. Was he, like my mother, trying to get me to relive that shitty period in my life?

“Fuck.” I got up from the bed and glared furiously at him. “I thought you at least would be on my side! For Christ’s sake!” I swore and threw the ice bag on the floor. I wanted to smash something up again. The Boy inside me was pushing against my chest, ready to bust out and scream.

Once again, he was feeling misunderstood.

“I am always on your side, but you’re not okay, Neil. And you know it, too.” He got up as well and walked toward me. I took a step back, because I didn’t want him near me—not when I was in that kind of state.

“You’re not okay at all. Look at yourself.” He jerked his chin toward my hands, but he was surely also referring to the thing in my soul. The thing that was invisible to the human eye that my brother knew perfectly well.

“Leave.” I pointed to the door. I wanted to be alone again. I needed to wash myself again. Wash and wash and wash and wash again. The boiling water would ease my discomfort and soothe some of my rage. Actually…I knew of one other way to erase the thoughts that were wrapped around my brain like barbed fucking wire.

“Neil, please…just listen—”

I pointed at the door again, daring him to keep arguing with me. Logan knew my hair-trigger temper, my reactive nature. He knew when he could talk to me and when to just avoid me.

So he sighed and hung his head as he left the room, overwhelmed by me and all the things that came along with me.

I went back to the shower again; this time, I stayed there for a full hour. The amber-scented shower gel was so strong it made me nauseous, but at the same time, it was the only thing I wanted to be able to smell on me. When I was done, I dressed myself in a simple black sweatshirt and a pair of jeans before sitting down at my desk and opening up my laptop.

I should have kept working on my project for Professor Robinson because the due date was rapidly approaching, but instead my eyewandered over the top of my desk, to the folder where I kept clippings of stories that had appeared in the newspapers years before. Back when I had become one of the protagonists of a scandal that had caught the whole city’s attention.

It had turned out to be a network.

A complex shadow world.

Something that went well beyond journalistic simplifications about the internet and required an understanding of its hidden depths. The vilest and most dangerous parts.

My hands began to shake, and I refused to open the folder as my false tachycardia started up again. After all, the only reason I kept the thing was to remind me of who I had been: helpless before that woman, when I should have been able to stop her.

I caught her smell again on the air. Her sweat on my skin; her tongue on my neck. My lips twisted in disgust. I found myself, once again, fighting the child version of myself who tried to force me to remember, who muddied my vision with pictures from the past and bewildered my senses with smells and tastes that I didn’t want to recognize.

I shut my laptop and sighed in frustration.

Memories were inundating me, ready to pull me under and drown me.

I needed something to distract me; to rescue me.

To calm the Boy down.

I leaped to my feet and left the room with the worst of intentions. I didn’t care who else I hurt as long as I got my moment of peace. I looked carefully around, but there was no one there. No obstacles to get in the way of my latest fuckup in progress.

I walked the short stretch of hallway that separated me from Selene’s room, and not bothering to knock, I opened the door and went inside. I closed the door behind me and turned the lock. Then, I took a look around.

It looked like a room for a princess.

Everything was in its place. The bright walls and elegant furnishings lent it a sophisticated, refined air. It smelled like Selene, like that coconut scent that had somehow become my favorite smell.

I advanced slowly through the room, in search of my prey. I had beencertain I would find her there at that time of night, but there was no sign of her.

Suddenly, a sound drew my attention. It was coming from the en suite bathroom, so I moved toward the open door.

She stood in front of the mirror, intent on putting her hair up in a high ponytail with nothing but a red towel covering her slim, sculpted body. Selene truly had the beauty of a goddess—of a Venus. Her long, defined legs were left exposed by the towel, which only barely covered her ass. I put a hand on my fly because a stab of want had hit me in the lower abdomen and ignited a flame that I wasn’t going to be able to control for much longer.

I leaned against the doorframe, arms folded, waiting for her to notice my presence. Selene picked up a jar of scented cream and scooped some into the palm of her hand before slowly spreading it over her still-damp skin. I devoured her with my eyes like a starving animal while she continued to tend to herself. Completely unaware that I was standing there, unmoving, staring at her like a peeping tom.