Page 125 of The Sun & Her Burn

She shrugged slightly, but her gaze was narrow with intensity as she pinned me in place with it. “I might not know the details, but I know the shape of your heart, Adam Meyers. People have fallen in love with less.”

“Don’t speak of love,” I hissed. “You swore to me when we started this, you would not fall in love with me.”

She cocked her head, completely unruffled. “Funny, I don’t remember you promising to do the same.”

“I’m going out,” I declared as alarm bells trilled in my head. “Don’t wait up.”

“Where are you going?” she asked, and I could hear her get off the chair as I turned around to head back into the house.

“Out,” I bit off the words. “Just because we live together doesn’t mean I have to report all my doings to you, Linnea.”

“You’re mean when you’re scared,” she singsonged like the brat she was. Always pushing me, always prodding for weakness so she could wrench it open and kiss it better.

Well, not this time.

If she touched me again, I’d come apart.

Want pushed against my skin like an infection, bloating and ugly, just waiting to split the fragile flesh and ooze into the open.

I kept forgetting why I couldn’t have her, him, them.

And then, something would remind me by kicking me in the bloody teeth.

“Stay,” Linnea asked as she followed me through the kitchen to the foyer where she watched me tug on a jacket and toe into a pair of loafers without bothering with socks. “You can’t be going anywhere good looking like that.”

“You want to know where I’m going?” I growled through my teeth, spinning toward her and taking the three large steps between us so I could wrap my hand around her throat again.“I’m going to a club so I can slack some of this relentless thirst you and Sebastian have cursed me with.”

“You don’t need to leave the house for that,” she said calmly, but her eyes were bright with daring, and she leaned hard into my grip around her neck.

“I do,” I gritted out. “This situation is rapidly devolving into something without rules and boundaries. Something that could hurt us all.”

“I don’t think you can stop it now,” she said quietly. “You and Sebastian, Sebastian and me, maybe even the path that brought us here to the three of us now, it all started a long time ago.”

“Do you know why Oscar Hampton is coming after me now?” I demanded as poison bubbled up my throat and over my tongue. “Because I was lonely after Sebastian and Savannah left, and I ran into Oscar at a club in London whilst I was visiting. He knew about my bisexuality, about how Savannah and I used to be.”

I closed my eyes as memories swept through me like ghosts, leaving nausea and goose bumps in their wake.

“I just wanted a friend.” I forced the words through my tight throat but didn’t look at her. “I just wanted to be seen for a moment after feeling invisible for so long even in front of masses.”

“And he took advantage?”

I nodded slightly. “It was a mistake. I was deep into my drinking stage, and he took advantage of that. I hardly remember the evening, but I woke up naked in a hotel room with Oscar smiling beside me. I told him once was more than enough, after I was sick in the toilet. He seemed fine with it. Only, a few weeks later, he called asking for a favor.”

Linnea made a humming noise of realization. “He started blackmailing you.”

“Yes.” It felt good to talk about it with someone other than my publicist, agent, and manager. “I didn’t even realize at first.” My laugh was rough enough to hurt my throat. “Only when he asked to be production designer on my latest Jonathon Cross film and I told him it wasn’t possible did he start threatening me.”

“How long?” she whispered.

I opened my eyes to see her beautiful face suffused, not with pity as I’d feared, but rage.

“Seven years,” I told her. “Ten months ago, when I was signed on to play Anton Daventry in the spy films, I drew a hard line and told him no more.”

“And he told you he had a sex tape,” she filled in the blanks. “So all this started.”

“All this started,” I agreed, realizing my hand on her throat had softened, my thumb pressing lightly against her pulse to feel it pound steadily against my skin. It was wildly soothing. “Everything I’ve ever wanted, Linnea, has ended brutally. Perhaps, if I keep myself from loving you, from loving him, I can keep that taint for you both.”

“Adam.” She exhaled my name and reached up to touch my jaw with her fingertips so gently, I wondered if she thought I might break. “That’s not how life works, honey.”