Page 27 of Dark Reasons

"Iknowyou did!"

"I didn't."

That gets another erratic laugh out of me. "Tell me the time again."

His frown creates deep pits in the corners of his mouth. They barely shift when he talks; I could be conversing with a mannequin. "I said it was after 2."

"Your phone showed a different time, didn't you notice?"

Jamison's forehead is a mire of wrinkles. "That's impossible."

"It's not after 2, it's after 3."

"What are you on about?" He releases me, shifting over to grab at his phone where he left it on the floor beside us. I can't see the screen, but I don't have to. The blue light dances over his eyes as they widen. "How..."

Rising on my elbows, I wait for him to look at me before I speak. "I keep my phone an hour slower. Mine says after 2. I guess I woke up just as you were looking through it, so you thought that was the actual time." I motion at his bag. "Did you stick it in there, planning to put it back by my pillow?"

His tongue runs over his bottom lip in a slow swoop. "Why," he says thickly, "would you keep your clock set to the wrong time?"

I shrug, and my god, it feels fuckinggoodto know something he doesn't. "That's a secret."

Jamison tosses his phone down onto the floor violently. It bounces and slides, and I flinch from the sound. He stays where he is, his torso lit up by the streetlamps outside, the yellow sheet almost transparent. The shadow of his long legs beneath. The hint of other things that make my insides hot and tingly.

His onyx eyes fix on me with a mix of disdain and... I swear it's admiration. The look has my heart racing at top speed. "You're not as easy to read as I thought, Selena."

"Thanks," I say sarcastically.

He adjusts his sheet, the fabric loosening, sliding lower. I glance helplessly. The sight of his forest green briefs greets me. But I can't tell more than that. I'll never know if he was anywhere near as turned on as I was by our wicked games.

I look up; Jamison holds my stare evenly. Flustered more than ever I flip around, flopping onto my pillow, facing the opposite wall. "I'm going back to sleep," I mumble.

The floor doesn't creak, it doesn't have to, I can feel his presence next to me. The temperature change in the air, the way his scent swaddles me in its embrace. I'm still wet from earlier; I squeeze my knees together. There's a slightshiffnoise. I wait a minute, until I think he's gone, before turning over. My phone is back where I left it earlier in the night.

If I hadn't caught him in the act, I'd have never known he'd taken it.

But that's not my main worry.

Something much bigger happened tonight.

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