Suddenly, his golden eye flicked over to me, and I was struck with that same piercing magnetism that I’d felt when I first saw him on the patio. The same heat ran through my body as when he’d looked at me during that scene an hour ago while he was on top of Alina pretending to fuck her…
Was he wishing… was he wishing he was fucking me instead?
Just as the heat rose into my cheeks again and I felt the pulsing in my pants, there was a rustling from outside the little area we were in. Someone was approaching.
Silently, I cursed whoever it was. Whoever decided to stumble along this way was now my mortal enemy for interrupting the silent moment between me and Leo; it completely threw off the vibe.
Leo looked away from me and to the entrance to the little cove of green.
All I wanted was to have his eyes back on me; even if it was only one.
Reese Riley appeared in the entryway, stopped in his tracks.
Chapter Ten
Like Leo, Reese looked comically out of place among the greenery since he was wearing a flawless fitted suit.
There was something uncomfortable that shuddered in the air as Reese looked at Leo, then at me.
Was that… was that jealousy?
Then he eyed the space on the bench between us and how empty it was. His steely eyes softened to a liquid silver.
“My apologies gentlemen, I didn’t mean to interrupt quiet time,” he said with a smirk.
I piped up and said all the things you’re expected to say in situations like those: That he wasn’t interrupting anything, that it was no big deal, and that he was welcome to join us. But he waved all of my words away like he was batting away a cloud of annoying insects.
“I’m afraid I have to regretfully decline,” he said, his poise and posture returning as he backed away. “I was just scouting out lighting and setting for an upcoming scene.”
And just like that, he was gone, lost in the labyrinth of the garden.
I looked at Leo, scrambling for scraps of someone that could make sense of what had just happened. But all he did was move his eyes back down to his book, lost in the world of the Black Castle.
Was… was Reese hoping to find Leo alone? My instincts were tingling on that, determined that they had some kind of secret relationship going on. The way that Reese had moved his hand down Leo’s shoulder — not only once, but twice — hinted that there was something amiss.
But Leo was stoic; unchanged. Surely if there was something between them, Leo would have shown some reaction to Reese showing up like that? Some relief maybe, some softening of the tension in his shoulders.
I longed to reach out and touch his shoulders, feel the way the shirt clung to his back like that…
Blush rose into my cheeks once again and my cock pulsed.
“You don’t have to stay,” Leo said in a flat voice, not moving his eyes from his book.
I felt the pain of rejection punch me in the gut. He didn’t want me here; he preferred silence and alone time to my company.
“Alright— I’ll go…” I said, blinking tears out of my eyes.
The truth was, I wasn’t wanted anywhere. Mason had called me a pawn, and that’s all I was to these people. Some rando who showed up in their domain, in Valhalla where they had all of the power and control. And what was I? Some useless nobody.
I got up from the bench, tucked my phone into my pocket, and headed towards the exit.
That’s when Leo finally looked up.
“Charlie,” he said, my name coming out of his mouth in a different way than I’ve ever heard before. His molasses voice caressed the syllables in a way that I liked, rounding around the letters. It was like for the first time in my life, someone was saying my name right.
I blinked, fighting back tears and turned to look at him.
Those gold eyes were fixed on me again, seeing through everything that I was. He was looking into my core, into the part of me that had never been loved.
That same part that Hazel had called out the moment we met.
“You’re important,” he said slowly and carefully. “Don’t let any of these assholes make you feel like you’re not.”
It was as if cupid fired an arrow — no, a freaking missile straight at my heart. It was beating so fast that I thought it would crack the walls of my chest and spill out onto the ground between us.
But despite all of these fluttering, twisting feelings that were swirling inside me, altering the shape of my soul, all I could mutter was, “Thanks.”
Then I yanked my eyes away from his and left.
It took me a few minutes to walk off that… whatever that was. Those eyes, how they could see through me, look into my mind and see what was worrying me…
And how he said just the thing I needed to hear right at that moment. It had me trying to figure him out even more, trying to grapple with this cocktail of fear and curiosity.
I needed to know him. I needed to know everything about him. But first, I needed to create distance so I could breathe.
After a few minutes, I was safely in the town by the seaside, lost in the anonymity of the crowd. The feeling of no one recognizing me was comforting; like I was hiding in plain sight.
Still, I swerved into a sweets shop where I only recognized the word “Dolce” on the sign. There were only a few people in here — perfect.
I sat in a chair near the window and pretended to look at the menu, but I was thinking about Leo. Halfheartedly, I made a selection by pointing at some cupcake thing when the waiter came by.
As soon as he was gone, I dove into my phone and searched “Leo Knight.”
Picture after picture of his dazzling good looks
