042— THREE KNOCKS.

Daniel stepped back again.

Then again.

His mouth opened and closed and something crossed his face that he was trying to keep casual and failing at completely. "I'll — yeah. I'll take my leave." 

He looked at me once — something in his eyes I didn't get to read before Kai's presence in the air swallowed the whole balcony, and then he was gone. 

Footsteps. Door. Silence.

Kai turned to me.

"So this is what you do now."

"Excuse me—"

"Following strangers to secluded areas. Do you have any idea what could…"

"How," I said, stepping forward, "is that your business?"

He said nothing.

I turned and walked toward the door.

His hand closed around my wrist.

I stopped and looked down at his hand. Looked up at his face. My heart was going at a rate that was genuinely embarrassing and I made sure absolutely none of that showed.

"Why are you even here," I said. "You said you weren't coming. You ruined the whole—"

"Would you have preferred I didn't come?" His voice was lower now. Not cold. Something with heat running underneath it that he was managing poorly. "With him finding hidden balconies to take you to."

"He's harmless—"

"He was about to put his hands on you."

"Maybe I wanted him to."

His jaw tightened so hard I heard it.

"Did you," he said quietly.

We looked at each other.

The mountain was very quiet around us.

I pulled my wrist back and walked inside.

                    …

I shut my room door and stood against it and breathed.

Why was he here? He'd said he wasn't coming — specifically, clearly, standing in the doorway of the drawing room with those cloudy eyes — and then he'd shown up anyway and materialised on a hidden balcony like he'd been tracking me through the building and the worst part, the genuinely unacceptable part, was that something in my chest had gone warm when I saw him standing there.

*The whole property is mine.*

Said so quietly. Like a fact that had always been true and Daniel had simply failed to research it.

I pressed my hands over my face.

Why did he do this? Disappear for two days and then show up on a mountain and look at me like — like—

I grabbed my phone and texted Elena. ‘Don't leave the main building please. Stay inside.’

No reply.

I grabbed my jacket and went to find her.

                     …

I stepped into the corridor and nearly walked into Anya.

She was passing. Or she had been passing. Now she was stopped, two feet away, looking at me with an expression that had been building for longer than today.

"Anya—"

She started walking.

"Anya." I went after her. Caught up. "Please. I'm sorry. I'm really sorry, I didn't want to hide it from you, I just—"

She stopped so suddenly I almost ran into her again.

"Do you know," she said, "that I went to your apartment."

I went still.

"The one you never told me about." Her voice was steady in the way that cost something. 

"I found it myself. I went there because you'd stopped responding and I was worried and I knocked on the door for ten minutes." Her eyes were wet but none of it fell. 

"It was empty, Sloane. Everything was gone. You were just — gone. And I stood there not knowing if you were dead or taken or if you'd just decided I wasn't worth telling."

"It wasn't like that—"

"Then what was it like?" Not angry. Worse than angry. Tired. 

"Because from where I'm standing I've been your friend for months and you've been living with Kai Volkov — KAI VOLKOV— and I found out by accident in a rink corridor." She looked at me. "What am I to you? Seriously. What am I?"

"You're my closest friend here…"

"Then act like it." Her jaw moved. "I don't even want to know anymore. What's the point? You'll just find another reason not to tell me."

She walked.

"Anya—"

She didn't look back.

Not once.

I stood in the corridor and watched her go and the ache in my chest was deep and I pressed my hand against it and stood there until the sound of her footsteps was completely gone.

                         …

Evening arrived.

The bonfire smell came through my window. Wood, smoke and cold air, and I could hear the team gathering downstairs, voices and laughter building.

I sat on my bed and stared at my phone and thought about texting Anya and didn't.

A knock at my door.

"Elena?" I called.

Nothing.

I crossed the room and opened it.

Kai.

Standing in the corridor with his hands in his pockets looking at me with that face that gave away exactly nothing. I grabbed the door immediately.

He was inside before I got it halfway shut.

"Get out."

"I'm checking the rooms." He walked past me, unhurried, looking at the window latch and the wardrobe and the general layout with the focused attention of someone taking a security inventory.

"You're checking my room."

"External threats require—"

"External THREATS." I shut the door because leaving it open felt like losing something. "You mean Daniel. You mean the perfectly harmless human man who was being nice to me on a balcony."

"Secluded balcony."

"You own the building apparently so all the balconies are yours anyway—"

"Exactly."

"That wasn't a compliment." I stepped toward him. "Get out. I need to get dressed for the bonfire."

He sat on the chair in the corner.

Just sat. Like I hadn't spoken.

"Kai." My voice was going. I could hear it going. 

"Don't you dare. Don't you dare do this. Push then pull, disappear then show up, then look at me like—" I stopped. Started again. "You don't get to keep doing this whenever you feel like it. You don't get to just walk into my room and sit there and act like you have any right to be here after two days of—"

He stood up.

Not fast. Just stood, and crossed the room toward me and his voice when he spoke was lower than usual, rougher at the edges, the voice from the painting room that I had been trying to forget for days.

"Do you not know… what I want?" He kept coming. "Or do you just enjoy pretending you don't."

I stepped back. "I don't—"

"Because from where I'm standing…"

"Don't." I stepped back again. "Don't do that voice."

"What voice?"

"You know what voice—"

My back hit the wall.

He stopped in front of me. Close. Too close. The room had gotten very small very fast and his eyes were doing the thing. Not cold, nothing cold about any of this, and I pushed both hands against his chest.

Brick. Immovable. He didn't shift an inch.

"Get out of my face," I said. "You don't get to act like you want me and then—"

"It's you," he said, "who doesn't want me." His voice was so low it was barely sound. "And now you want to act like you have no part in any of this."

"That is not—"

"Is it not?" He leaned slightly. Not touching. Just his face coming closer to my neck and I felt the warmth of him before contact and my knees did something humiliating. "You pretend," he said, against my skin, "but your pulse—"

He exhaled slowly.

Inhaled.

Right there. Against my throat. Taking his time.

My fingers gripped the front of his shirt before I decided to do anything.

He lifted his head and looked at me. His thumb came up and traced my lower lip — barely touching, barely anything, and the air between our faces became unbreathable.

He leaned in.

"Don't," I said. Barely a word. "Don't."

He stopped. A centimetre away. His eyes on mine.

"Tell me you don't want me," he said quietly. "Say it to my face. Mean it." A beat. "And I'll leave."

I looked at him.

My chest was rising and falling.

His eyes were waiting.

The words were right there. Simple. Four of them. I opened my mouth.

Nothing came out.

"Say it," he said. Lower now.

Three knocks on the door.

"Sloane?" Daniel's voice, muffled through the wood. "Are you okay in there?"

I broke away. "I need to answer—"

Kai's hand came to the wall beside my head.

"You're not opening that door," he said quietly.

"I can do whatever I—"

"Sloane?" Daniel again. "I heard voices, just checking…"

"And you're not answering that either."

"You can't tell me what to—" I dropped my voice to a whisper. "He'll think something is wrong—"

"Something is wrong," Kai said. His eyes hadn't moved from mine once. "He's on the other side of your door."

I almost laughed. "What are you going to do if I answer? Nothing. You'll do—"

"I'll shut you up," he said simply.

I stared at him. "And how exactly are you planning to—"

He kissed me.