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“How have you been, dear?” she asks before Sam steps out.

He nods toward the stairs. “Another time, mom. I need to talk to Adeline,” he says, grabbing my hand and tugging me up the stairs, the floorboards creaking as he pulls me toward his room.

The moment we step inside, his lips are on me, and I find myself pushed against the wall, his lips devouring mine. He starts trying to pull my jumper off over my head.

“Sam, wait. That’s not why I am here,” I try to tell him while he keeps trying to undress me. He starts tugging on my pants, and I grab his hands, stopping him.

“Sam, wait. Stop,” I tell him.

He lets go, walking off and sitting on his bed. “Is this about your bosses? Are you fucking them?”

“What? No, why would you say that?”

“Could have fooled me,” he says, and I scrunch up my face in confusion.

What the fuck was he talking about? I sit on the bed beside him. His room is cleaner than mine, not a speck of dust, the drawers clear of clutter, while mine are covered with cosmetics and pictures. Though, he does have one photo of him and me at the fair on a Ferris wheel. I get up, picking it up and looking at it.

“You still have this?” I ask, and he looks up at me, giving a swift nod.

He looks sad for some reason I don’t understand; maybe his father’s death has been getting to him more than I thought.

“What happened the other night? I have little to no recollection. I remember us meeting at the diner, but that’s where I go blank. Then I woke up at home,” I tell him.

“What, you think you can play dumb, and I would just fall for it? You made me look like a fool,” he snaps, and I am surprised by his sudden anger.

I turn to face him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Why haven’t you been answering my calls?”

“Calls? You haven’t tried to ring once, Adeline, and you disconnected your phone, so don’t scold me. You should have told me you were involved with someone else instead of letting me find out when they catch you sneaking around with me,” he says, standing up, his hands fisted close to his side.

I have never seen him like this; he is angry, and his anger kind of frightens me. “What are you talking about, Sam? You’re not making any sense,” I tell him.

He raises his eyebrows at me. “I can’t believe you. As soon as they sat down, I knew that you were fucking them, the way they looked at me. Then instead of choosing me, you just sat there. Do you know how humiliating that was?”

“Who are you talking about? I don’t remember anything from that night, Sam. That’s why I am here. I just remember waking up and finding that you bit me and wouldn’t return my calls.”

“Bit you? I never bit you, Adeline. We didn’t even leave together. You left with your bosses. I saw the entire thing as they shoved you in their car, and you left with them. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me. You could have saved me the humiliation.”

“I never left with them. I came back here with you,” I tell him, trying to wrack my brain.

It sounds right, yet I just can’t picture it.

“No, Adeline. You left with some man called Eli. I never got the other one’s name,” he says, rubbing his face. “Did they do something to you?”

“No, I… I don’t remember. I just woke up with a huge bite mark on my neck. I thought you did it.”

“Show me. You never came back home with me, Adeline. You went home with your bosses, not me,” he says, standing up and reaching for my shirt. “Where is it?”

“No, it is on my neck,” I tell him, tugging my shirt down and moving my hair.

Sam gasps, stepping back. “Get out, get out now, Adeline!”

“What?”

“Get out of my house, Adeline. You have been marked.”

“Marked?”

“Get out!” he bellows, hitting his bedside drawers with his fist.