Page 29 of Skyn
“How could he…?”
“It makes me sick…”
“Filthy…”
I wince against each word, but Ben, with his fucking dampeners, simply says, “Chin up.”
We take the long walk to the front, where the Iku table awaits us. Except our names aren’t anywhere on the meticulously arranged place cards. The guests’ smug, knowing looks are as sharp as broken glass as they watch our confusion.
“Where are we expected to sit, Mother?” Ben asks. His voice is level, but I can feel the tension radiating off him.
“Oh, didn’t I tell you?” she says. Her voice drips with false sweetness. “We made you both a little bunker in the back so your wife could be comfortable.” She extends a shining chrome finger with sharp red claws toward a small table in the corner, heaped with soil and spattered in oil, like some grotesque parody of the mines I crawled out of.
Michael, Ben’s younger brother, takes his place next to their grandfather at the table. Michael eyes me with a touch of triumph. He blows me a quiet kiss.
The room shifts into a collective holding of breath, waiting to see how we react.
Ben nods as if accepting some unspoken challenge, then turns to me with the kind of intensity that makes my stomach drop. “Shall we?”
There is something about the way he extends his arm—so regal, so utterly composed—that makes this feel like a coup rather than a concession. I slide my hand into the crook of his elbow, allowing him to lead me toward the disgrace they’ve so graciously prepared for us.
I gasp, and the room, already breathless, holds even tighter.
Ben steps to the table, so fucking precise, and sits.
Um…ok.
Just as I am readying myself to do the same, he reaches for my hips and lowers me. Not into the grime-streaked chair mind you, but onto his lap.His lap.
I go rigid, my body hyper-aware of every point of contact—my ass flushes against his middle. My back against his hard stomach. His arm, firm around my waist, the heat of his skin through my clothes.
I keep thinking about the dirt and the greasy, oily residue seeping into the delicate weave of Ben’s jacket. I don’t typically cry over fabric, but there is something about watching that expensive jacket absorb the filth. I feel the tear before I even realize it’s falling, warm and heavy, sliding down my cheek.
Intellectually, I know it’sjusta nice jacket, but no one else has ever, without question or hesitation, just given something up for me.
The jacket. I think I’m falling in love with the jacket.
“I’m sorry, did you think I’d let my wife sit in the dirt?” Ben’s voice is pleasant and effortless. But his grip on me could bruise.
Ben picks up the fork from the soiled tablecloth—an old, tarnished thing that looks like it was dug up from the mines—and begins eating the meal before him. Fork up, open mouth, a few chews, swallow. Over and over again.
I follow suit, picking up my own fork and spearing a piece of meat. The food is fine—I don’t marvel at the fact that it’s better than anything I had in the mines because the humiliation hanging in the air makes it taste like ash.
The room doesn’t know what to do with itself.
Idon’t know what to do with myself.
His breath brushes the shell of my ear like a whisper of war. His voice is low, meant only for me. “Hold still.”
I disobey and tilt my head just slightly, baring my throat.
And, God help me, Ben fucking lifts his hips. And I. Am. Unraveling. At this stupid-ass charity dinner.
I swear I feel him smile against my skin.
Chapter14
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