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I’m glad the lights are off.
I’m glad he can’t see how much his presence affects me.
“I had to come,” he breathes, and maybe I’m still dreaming, after all.He’s actually here to see me. He wants to see me.
Then he looks over my shoulders, scanning the room like he expects someone else to be lurking. “You have to come with me.”
Scratch that. He wants to kidnap me.
This particular fantasy played itself out more quickly than I would’ve thought.
“What are you talking about?”
He walks to my closet and tears it open. “Pack a bag.”
My hands tighten over my stomach protectively. “It’s been months—literally months—of silence, and now, you show up in the middle of the night and expect me to pack and leave with you?”
“We don’t have time to argue. Trust me.”
I bark out a bitter laugh. “That’s the last thing on Earth I plan on doing.”
How many times have I sat under the tree in the backyard and planned what I’d say to Arsen if I had the chance? I’ve rehearsed ranting and sobbing about how he used and discarded me, or hitting him with anI’m-not-mad-just-disappointedfrown. On dark days, there was begging—for the contract to be void, for the two of us to work out some kind of shared custody.
But now, he’s here in front of me, and I can’t drum up a single word.
The worst part is that he’s not here because he’s overcome with missing me. Or because he regrets not being there for his own daughter.
He’s here because he expects to snap his fingers and get his way.
Well,fuck that.
I flick on the lamp next to my bed, blinking against the sudden brightness. “I’m your surrogate, but that doesn’t mean you get to waltz into my life and—” I turn to face him and gasp. “Oh my God, you’re bleeding.” Everything I was going to say drains away as I rush towards him. “You’re covered in blood. You’re hurt?—”
“It’s fine,” he says.
“‘Fine’?!” I grab his arm, twisting it towards the light. Blood streaks across his forearms and is soaked through his sleeves. “This is not ‘fine’! There’s blood everywhere. You need to get to a hospital.”
Is this why he’s here? He got hurt, and he wanted to see me?
“It’s fine because it’s not mine.”
I go cold. His green eyes are hooded but clear. He’s not weak from blood loss or fading towards unconsciousness.
It’s not his blood…
Which means it belongs to someone else.
And if Arsen is here and needs me to leave, it must mean the house is no longer secure. Which means…
I stumble back, shaking my head. “Not Dominik.”
His eyes narrow. “That would upset you, would it?”
“What kind of question is that? Of course it would upset me! Dominik is my friend.”
“Is that all the two of you are?Friends?” He says it like it’s a dirty word. Like he’s never had a friend.
Hell, maybe he hasn’t.
