Page 23 of Skyn
“It’s just that this all has an expiration date, right? I can’t stay here like this forever. If you don’t regret it now, you will.”
I don’t expect him to drop his voice lower, eyes flicking downward when he says, “I hurt someone.”
I pause, mirroring the lesson he just gave me. “Lily?”
His throat works like the words are hard to get out. “I was so angry at my family, at all of it. And I let myself believe she was a part of it. But she wasn’t. She was…collateral damage.”
Maybe I should be smug or jealous, but I’m not. “Then tell her that.”
His eyes flick to mine, wary. “It’s not that simple.”
“Sure it is,” I say, stepping closer, my voice light because I know he needs it. “You go find her. Say, ‘Lily, I was an asshole.’ And then—this is important—you shut up and let her yell at you for a while.”
I lean over the balcony, tossing a stick down to the sand below, testing gravity like a five-year-old. “How did you two typically communicate?”
“I’m very good at this.” He clasps his hands behind his back. “I produced a report of the economic viability of our pairing.” He lifts his fingers, ticking them off like a grim to-do list. “I made a mathematical model of our entire life; daily, I leave these data packets at her door. I include notes explaining each data module in detail.”
“As someone who’s had a restraining order filed against them,” I say, “please stop doing that.”
“That’s illogical,” he replied. “Relationships are about assurances. I want to make sure she knows that the calculations are in our favor.”
“The wordcalculationsis hot.” I fan myself.
“You are making fun.” He sounds disappointed.
“Okay, no, I’m suggesting you assure her in a different way… Will she be at this Food Science Ball?”
I lean too far over the railing, and suddenly, the terrifying lurch of vertigo hits me. Ben moves faster than I thought possible, his hands clamping onto my hips, pulling me down from the ledge before I fall.
“Am I taking advice from a woman who doesn’t know how gravity works?”
I tug at the hem of my skirt, conscious of how it rode up to my hip. I think of the rumors and how easily he could sink his teeth into me. I have to know if my gut is wrong about Ben.
“Do you want to bite me?” I blurt, instantly regretting the words.
He finally steps back, but not before giving me a long appraising look. Like he’s really thinking about it. “I’ve given up using my probability matrix on you,” he says, his voice clipped, like he doesn’t trust himself to say more. He sits back down, but I still feel the pull of him. Like I’m moving into his orbit whether I wanted to or not.
I straighten, adjusting my skirt again, feeling oddly cold without him near. “They say the machines get special teeth installed,” I say, trying to make a joke of it. “You know, to break through bone and gristle.”
For a second, I think he might laugh, but instead, he opens his mouth. “These are just molars,” he says, holding his jaw open, letting me peer inside like a school nurse.
“So that’s a lie?” I ask, my fingers hovering near his teeth.
“It’s a lie,” he confirms, watching me with the perplexed brow I’m beginning to recognize as his Fawl look.
My index finger tentatively touches his tooth, and I yank it back just as he snaps his mouth shut. I jump, then let out a hoot of laughter. If I didn’t know better, I would think Ben tried to joke with me. But his face is back to flat and unreadable.
“What if I told you there are rumors that your company uses human meat and that the machines eat people from the underground?”
“What if I told you that conspiracy and witchcraft is the way the uninformed make sense of a world too confusing for them to fathom?”
“I would say it sounds elitist.”
“Perhaps, on this point, I am.”
“But you all are in charge of preventing overpopulation. How?”
“Self-control,” he says softly. He looks uncomfortable all of a sudden.
