Page 30 of Where the Snakes Sleep

I want to argue, but my tongue is frozen. His gaze drifts to my throat—a microsecond of attention, but it leaves a heat trail across my skin.

“Wear whatever makes you comfortable,” he says, the words so innocent that my brain immediately twists them into filth.

Camille leaves before I can recover enough to retort. I stand there, rooted by the afterimage of his smile and the echo of his voice in the hollowed-out house. I can’t stop replaying the conversation—the way he watched me, the way he said company, like it was the only thing he wanted.

I should feel triumphant, but mostly I feel like I’ve just been tackled at the fifty-yard line in front of a roaring crowd.

The hall is empty. The air is heavy with dust, sawdust, and the faint smell of male sweat. My chest is still tight, my head buzzing with a million questions and the certainty that the answers will hurt.

My hands shake as I pick up the pry bar from the floor and pretend to get back to work, but the rhythm is gone. I keep glancing at the clock, counting the hours until seven.

I can’t help but wonder if Camille’s invitation is a threat or a promise.

Or potentially, both.

7

Ryan

At six fifty, I’m staring into the fogged bathroom mirror, wondering what the fuck I’m doing. Having dinner at my neighbor’s house can’t hurt, even if I find him an annoying mix of weird and sexy. I’m in a new country, and for the past week, I’ve done nothing social, unless you count having the townsfolk stare at me with disdain every time I walk over there.

And while, sure, I’m not planning on staying here for very long, it’s still healthy to have friendly human interaction once in a while.

It is not because he has a massive dick, and I’m apparently an aspiring size queen.

That’s totally not why I’ve changed three times.

I’m allowed to want to look good.

I turn sideways and look back in the mirror, smoothing my hand down my chest and checking that the bandeau I’m wearing is doing its job, since I ended up choosing a rather tight, black turtleneck tank top.

The heat here is insane, even after the sun goes down, and I don’t want to be sweaty and uncomfortable during dinner.

My choice has nothing to do with how the top leaves just a sliver of bare skin between it and the camel-colored wide-leg trousers that sit a bit low on my hips.

I leave the cottage before I can talk myself into changing a fourth time and cut through the gap in the wall between our yards, careful to step around the rough patch I’d attempted to fix the other day—resulting only in a bruised foot, an equally bruised ego, and a new appreciation for the art of masonry.

Camille’s place is sprawling, with the main house sitting at the end of a very long gravel drive, looking hauntingly beautiful. The courtyard has three busted water fountains and a statue of some Roman guy with no arms, all of it lost in the bramble. It should look abandoned, but somehow it doesn’t.

I consider telling Camille he should spend less time beating his meat in his pool and actually do some yard work.

As I finally reach the front door, it swings open before I even raise my fist to knock. Camille is already there, hovering in the threshold with the kind of posture that would put a ballet dancer to shame. He’s changed from his usual neutral palette into a deep blue-green satin shirt, which does things to his skin that should be illegal. No one’s skin should look that lickable. It’s unfair.

Camille’s eyes drop to the strip of skin at my waist. The look he gives me is not subtle. I can feel it, like a draft on bare skin, and for a second I swear it hits me in the knees. I pull my bag tighter across my chest, but he only smiles, slow and sly.

“Bonsoir. You found it,” he says, stepping aside to let me in. His voice is low, almost a purr. “I was worried you might get lost.”

“Because we live so far away,” I quip, though my voice comes out quieter than I intended.

He huffs out a laugh, and I admire the way his lips move before focusing my attention elsewhere.

The entry hall is all stone arches and worn wood, the kind of Old World architecture that makes you feel like you should be carrying a candlestick and wearing a long nightgown as you search for the cause of a suspicious noise.

We don’t spend long there as he then leads me down a hallway, farther into the bowels of the house. The air feels cooler here, and our voices share a faint echo. I try not to stare at the paintings, but it’s hard not to notice the faces and the eyes following me down the corridor. They all look vaguely related, like iterations of the same family jawline, rendered with increasingly Gothic drama.

Camille stops at a set of double doors and motions me through. “I thought we’d eat in the library. The dining room is haunted by terrible acoustics.”

“Oh, okay.”