“You haven’t fucked me since you were Pri-ya. There’s an action for you. Says pretty much all there is to say.”
It burned him. Good. It was burning me, too. “This is some kind of pissing contest? Darroc got laid but you didn’t? That’s the only reason you’re mad?” What did he think it said? That I would touch him only if I was sex-starved? Or if the alternative was dying a mindless animal?
“You couldn’t begin to understand.”
“Try me.” If he’d ever just admit to one little feeling about me, I might admit to one about him.
“Don’t push me, Ms. Lane. This place is getting to me. You want the beast on your hands?”
I glanced at him. His eyes were sparking crimson and he was breathing hard, but not from exertion. I knew him. He could run for hours. “You want me, Jericho. Admit it. A lot more than once or twice. I’m under your skin. You think about me all the time. I keep you awake at night. Go ahead, say it.”
“Fuck you, Ms. Lane.”
“Is that your way of saying it?”
“That’s my way of saying grow up, little girl.”
I skidded to a halt, slipping and sliding on the black marble floor. The instant I stopped running, he did, too, as if we were bound by the same tether.
“If I’m a little girl, then that makes you a serious pervert.” The things we did together … I shot him a graphic reminder with my eyes.
Oh, so you’re finally ready to talk about them, his dark gaze mocked. Maybe I don’t want to now.
Too bad. You were always slapping me in the face with reminders. Turnabout’s fair play. But it sure wasn’t a little girl back in that bed, Jericho. It’s not a little girl you’re messing with now.
I poked him in the chest with my finger. “You died in front of my eyes and let me believe it was real, you bastard!” I felt like I was being torn in half—pulled toward the boudoir by destiny, rooted in place by the need to air my grievances.
He knocked my finger away. “Do you think it was fun for me?”
“I hated watching you die!”
“I hated doing it. It hurts every damned time.”
“I grieved!” I shouted. “I felt guilty—”
“Guilt isn’t grief,” he snapped.
“And lost—”
“Get a fucking road map. Lost isn’t grief, either.”
“And—and—and—” I broke off. There was no way I was telling him all the things I’d really felt. Like destroying the world for him.
“And what? What did you feel?”
“Guilt,” I shouted. I punched him, hard.
He shoved me, and I stumbled back against the wall.
I shoved him back. “And lost.”
“Don’t tell me you grieved me when you were really just pissed off about the mess you’d gotten yourself into. I died and you felt sorry for yourself. Nothing more.” His gaze flickered to my lips. I got that. He was once again furious with me and once again perfectly ready to have sex with me. The conundrum that was Barrons. Apparently it was impossible for him to feel anything as far as I was concerned without getting angry about it. Did anger make him want to have sex with me? Or was it that he always wanted to have sex with me that made him so angry?
“I was grieving more than that. You don’t know the first thing about me!”
“And you should have felt guilty.”
“So should you!”
“Guilt is wasted. Live, Ms. Lane.”
“Oh! Ms. Lane! Ms. Frigging Lane! There it is again. You tell me to feel guilty, then you tell me it’s wasted. Make up your mind! And don’t tell me to live. That’s exactly what I was doing that you’re so pissed about. I went on!”
“With the enemy!”
“Do you care how I went on, as long as I did? Isn’t that the lesson you’ve been trying to teach me? That adaptability is survivability? Don’t you think it would have been easier for me to lay down and quit once I thought you were dead? But I didn’t. You know why? Because some overbearing prick taught me that it was how you go on that matters.”
“The word that was supposed to be emphasized there was how. As in honorably.”
“What place does honor have in the face of death? And, please, did you honorably kill that woman you carried out of the Silver in your study?”
“You couldn’t possibly understand that, either.”
“That’s your answer for everything, isn’t it? I couldn’t possibly understand, so you’re not going to bother telling me. You know what I think, Jericho? You’re a coward. You won’t use words, because you don’t want anyone to hold you accountable,” I accused. “You won’t tell the truth, because then somebody might judge you, and God—”
“—has nothing to do with this and—”
“—forbid you actually get personal with me—”
“—I don’t give a damn about being judged—”
“—and I don’t mean try to have sex with me—”
“—I wasn’t trying to have sex with you—”
“—I didn’t mean at this precise moment. I meant—”
“—and it would have been impossible, anyway, because we’ve been running. I don’t have any bloody idea why we’ve been running,” he said irritably, “but you’re the one who started it and you’re the one that stopped.”
“—like knock down a few walls between us and see what happens. No, you’re such a coward that the only time you can call me by my name is when you’re either pretty sure I’m dying or you think I’m so out of my mind that I won’t notice. Seems like a hell of a wall to erect between yourself and someone you don’t like.”
“It’s not a wall. I merely endeavor to help you keep our boundaries straight. And I didn’t say I didn’t like you. ‘Like’ is such a puerile word. Mediocre people like things. The only question of any significant emotive content is: Can you live without it?”
I knew the answer to that question where he was concerned, and I didn’t like it one bit. “You think I need help understanding where our boundaries are? Do you understand where our boundaries are? Because they seemed pretty damned mysterious and movable to me!”