Page 27 of Sparks of Insanity
Suzy stared up at me in horror, scooting back from me as if I was the monster here, when all I’d done was take action to save her. Lifting Ember up onto my shoulder, I backed toward Suzy’s living room door.
“I’m so sorry about this. She’s… she’s had a rough time, but you won’t see her again. Or me, I guess. Get some ice on that,” I nodded at her head, and turned to leave, wondering where the fuck I was supposed to go from here.
16
Ember
Ihad a headachewhen I woke up, but that was only the first detail that quickly sank in for me. I was on a bed, but it wasn’t mine, and that momentary loss of memory had me panicking, and checking my clothes hadn’t been messed with. Had someone hurt me? Why couldn’t I remember?
“You’re fine, just on my bed, because I had no fucking idea what to do with you after.” I sat up in a rush at Ethan’s voice, and spotted him sitting on the floor with his back to the wall, beside the closed door of his room.
Now that I knew I was with him, that relief about being fully clothed, and untouched, was replaced with disappointment. It wasn’t that I wanted him touching me when I wasn’t aware of it, but didn’t he want me at all? It felt like he did when he kissed me.
Ethan was watching me as I sat up and looked around his room. My head throbbed with the movement and I groaned, reaching up to cup the side of it.
“I had no choice. You were going to kill her,” he said quietly, looking about as low and listless as I’d ever seen him. Gone was the smartly dressed, professional man I’d known. His crumpled t-shirt and jeans, coupled with bare feet, scruffed up hair, and that stubbly beard, were so alien to me, because it was the opposite of the way he’d always appeared when he came to my house.
“Ethan?”
He dragged his forearm across his face, more specifically across his eyes.
“I had no choice, Em.Yougave me no choice, but I never wanted to hurt you. I had to stop you.” Clearly he’d done something to render me unconscious, but it was the reason for it that bothered me the most. He did it to save her.
“Do you love her?” I asked, feeling my heart already breaking in two at the mere words. If he loved her, then he’d never love me, would he? I was just this foolish kid who’d misread every signal, every touch and kiss, and now we were both paying the price.
A sudden thud made me jump, drawing my attention back to him. His palm rested on the wooden floor, but he was glaring right at me.
“That’s what you care about? Not that you were about to murder a person, but do I love her? You realise it’s technically none of your business, right? This isn’t… we’re not in a relationship or something, Ember. This is some twisted mess we’re both stuck with, but, Jesus, no, okay? I don’t love her. I’ve never been interested in her. She was a friend. Someone to have a few drinks with now and then.”
“She’s a woman!” It didn’t make sense that there weren’t feelings involved, especially when I’d seen them kissing.
“Men and women can be friends, you know,” he said, with a slight twitch of his lips at those words.
“You were kissing her,” I reminded him, even though I wished I could sear the image from my brain, so I didn’t have to see it ever again.
Ethan sighed, scratching the top of his head for a moment.
“She kissed me. She caught me off guard that night, but I’d have pushed her away. You didn’t give me the chance to do that though. You put a brick through my window instead.”
I scooted to the edge of the bed, wanting less of a vast distance between us for the most important conversation of my life.
“You never told my family that part. You never mentioned me coming here at all. Why?”
He lifted his shoulders in a shrug.
“Who knows. Maybe I just wanted them to help us keep a distance between us, because it got out of hand. I never expected it to lead to all of this, but this is where we are now.”
I slipped off the end of the bed, moving onto my knees a few feet away from him, frowning when he flinched a little, and moved his legs up and away from me. Was he afraid of me? Disgusted by me?
“And where is that, Ethan?”
He hugged his legs tight against him as he closed his eyes.
“I have no fucking idea, Em.”
Ethan
I’D BROUGHT HER TO my house, but the longer she was here, the more I was expecting a visit, either from the police ifSuzy reported her, which technically she really should, or if her dads found her here.
