Page 42 of Threads That Bind Us

“And you didn’t think to ask any questions? You just trusted that this new handler was truly from The Syndicate?” Frustration coats Charlie’s words, like he’s annoyed by Kayden’s stupidity.

Can’t say I blame him.

Kayden glares down, his eyes glazed over in pain, his skin ghostly white.

“Number one rule of working for your fucking family is to not ask questions you don’t need the answer to,” he chokes out, his eyes rolling back in his head a bit. “Plus, she had the dove.”

Charlie stills, his body frozen behind me. It doesn’t even sound like he’s breathing.

“She showed you her sigil?” He asks, and it’s the first time I’ve ever heard him sound unsettled.

Kayden closes his eyes, nodding once as he shivers.

There are a few beats of strained silence, cut only by Kayden’s labored breathing, before Charlie moves.

The sudden absence of his body behind me feels like being dropped into the frigid ocean. I barely have time to turn around and look for him when he’s back, looping some kind of strap around Kayden’s injured leg. It takes me a few seconds to realize he’s putting a tourniquet on him. I can’t get my body to move the way I want it to, to do anything at all, as I watch him rachet the band tighter and tighter as Kayden screams. The little stream of blood that was flowing from Kayden’s leg peters out, and Charlie turns back to me.

He doesn't say a word. Just holds his hand out to me. My body feels frozen though, my limbs heavy, and my brain is two steps behind whatever is happening. Charlie doesn’t seem upset or surprised, though. He just kneels down again, lacing his fingers through mine, and guides my body up.

I don’t look at Kayden as we leave. I’m not sure what’s happening to me, but the sudden shift in energy is making me feel weak and unmoored, and not in the pleasantly erotic way I was feeling with Charlie guiding my fingers on his blade. The stairs seem uneven and twice as long as they did on the way down as we head back to the main house.

As soon as the door clicks behind me, it’s like the blood that was pounding through my body suddenly stops moving at all. Stars dance in front of my eyes, and I don’t even have thewherewithal to be embarrassed as a cold sweat breaks out over my skin.

Charlie’s still silent, gripping me around the waist as I slump against him. He navigates me past Emily on the couch and through a little archway. I barely realize I’m about to throw up before he gently helps me to the floor, holding my hair back and away from my face.

I empty the contents of my stomach into the toilet, sweat pooling at the nape of my neck and dripping down my back. I grip the side of the bowl, trying to forcibly steady myself as I heave again and again. Every part of me feels raw and feverish, chills weakening my limbs and making me see double.

It's a few minutes before the muscles of my abdomen stop twitching, and the haziness at the edge of my vision starts to dissipate. I cough, wipe my mouth, clean myself up, all while Charlie rubs soft circles on my back.

As my senses come back to me, the humiliation I was missing before comes flooding in. I shrug Charlie’s hand off of me and force myself to stand.

I don’t even know how to explain what happened in that basement. The overwhelming feeling of rightness. The way my body seemed to know what to do before my brain did. The intimacy.

I can still feel Charlie’s touch against my skin, the thump of his heartbeat against my back, his breath so warm and close that his lips had to be nearly touching me.

It’s bad enough I wasthatturned on by his hand wrapped around mine, guiding the blade into Kayden’s skin. But to project that feeling onto Charlie? To imagine he wanted to be closer, to close my eyes and pretend this little lesson made him feel the same?

He told me he’s not interested. He’s made it clear. Forfuck’s sake,I made it clear. I grip the edge of the bathroom sink and shake myself. I’m so fucking frustrated. In a few weeks, I’ve gone from pissed at the thought of him blackmailing me into fucking him, to reluctantly attracted to him, to this? Wet and feeling like a live wire from nearly killing a man with him?

There’s something seriously wrong with me. What’s worse, I have absolutely no urge to fix it.

I snap my head up at the feeling of Charlie’s tentative touch against my back. When I find his eyes in the mirror, they still hold the same unforgiving hardness as they did when we walked down the stairs, but there’s something different at the edges. I’m too overwhelmed to read it, though.

“It’s okay,” he murmurs, his eyes tracing my reflection. “It’s a normal reaction.”

My stomach turns at his words, and I can feel a flush crawl up my chest and neck. Suddenly, it’s impossible to meet his gaze. Was I really so obvious? Could he tell how intoxicated I was by not only his touch, but what we were doing together?

Could he tell that wielding that knife to exact what I wanted felt like foreplay?

“Everyone gets sick their first few times. Even after years of experience, sometimes the adrenaline drop is just too much for your body to handle. It doesn’t make you any less capable.”

Of course. Of fuckingcourse,that’s what he means.

I try to swallow down the relief that he couldn’t see my desire, and the disappointment that he doesn’twantto see it. I turn on the faucet, splashing water on my face and rinsing out my mouth.

“Yeah, okay, thanks,” I stammer, pulling down my hair and retying it. I can feel his eyes on me, but I’m not brave enough to see the pity in them.

“I mean it, Gwen,” he says, and the heat of his body growscloser. I busy myself with washing my hands. “It happens to all of us.”