Page 46 of Oleander

“Thank you, they’re perfect.”

“Sorry,” I muttered. My skin had felt weird and ill-fitting since we’d come upstairs. Since we’d been alone.

My head was still full of Caspien, even with Ellie in front of me. His pretty mouth, his grey-blue eyes, his vicious sneer. There was comfort in those things. Because I knew my place in front of them. Beneath him.

Here, and perhaps whenever I was alone with Ellie, I felt like I was playing some role. One that didn’t suit me and that I clearly wasn’t very good at since I kept getting it wrong and missing my lines.

She nodded. “It’s okay. I’m over it.”

I couldn’t tell if that was true or not.

We still weren’t allowed to have the door closed, but it didn’t stop Ellie from scooting up the bed and planting her mouth on mine.

I kept my hands by my sides at first but then worried that she might read something into that, so I slid my hand into her hair and angled her head closer. Kissing her back as hard as I could. Analysing it even as it was happening.

Familiar, sweet, and safe.

All things the kiss with Caspien hadn’t been.

When she pressed her hand between my legs, tentative and gentle, I felt a stirring of something pleasant. But I didn’t know if it was because I was thinking about Caspien’s mouth while I compared them both.

But soon, he was all I was thinking about, and the pleasant feeling spread down and out, so it was another mouth and some other hand on my dick.

I pulled back quickly, guilty.

Ellie gave me a look of confusion that I tried smiling at.

I was relieved when Luke’s voice from the bottom of the stairs crashed through the awkwardness.

“Jude! Come down a minute, will you?”

I gave Ellie a small smile and stood. “Uh, I’ll be back in a minute.”

She nodded, watching me with big doe eyes.

“The door was open,” I told Luke.

Instead of saying anything he just nodded toward the kitchen and then went back into the living room and closed the door. I could hear the title music of University Challenge begin.

Confused, I wandered down the hall to the kitchen and almost shat myself at what I found there.

Caspien sat at the kitchen table, hands clasped in front of him.

Only when I closed the kitchen door did he turn to look at me. His eyes were dark and faintly furious.

“What are you doing here?” My question came out rude. I’d been avoiding him for a reason and now here he was sitting at my kitchen bloody table.

“I could ask you the same thing,” he said.

I stared at him. “I live here.”

“It’s Thursday.”

“Right? And?”

“Oh, so you knew what day it was?” His eyes widened. “Because I thought maybe you’d gotten your days mixed up again. Like you did on Tuesday, but no. It seems you didn’t.”

“I didn’t.”