‘You really shouldn’t have done that,’ he said roughly.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, meaning it even as her heart pounded and her breath caught in her throat.
‘You will be.’
For a moment he hovered there, staring blindly down at her, his face tight and his body even tighter. But gradually the fierce blaze in his eyes ebbed, his expression relaxed and the colour returned to his face. Bella waited, not sure what to do or what to say. And then he dragged in a shaky breath, jerked away and fell back on the bed.
Giving him a few moments to recover, she lifted herself up onto her elbows. ‘So what was that all about?’ she murmured once his breathing had regulated and she’d felt whatever it was that had taken hold of him dissipate.
‘Nothing.’
She rolled onto her side and looked at him closely. If he thought he could get away with brushing her off like that he could think again. No way was she letting this lie. It was too intriguing for words and she intended to get to the bottom of it whether he liked it or not. ‘You’re pale and you’re shaking,’ she said softly. ‘That’s not nothing.’
Will sighed and rubbed a hand over his face and forced himself to calm down. The terror and the nausea that had slammed into him the minute he’d realised what she’d done were fading and it was fine. He was fine. But for a moment there, when Bella had tossed the keys out of the window, he’d thought he’d been about to pass out. ‘It’s no big deal,’ he muttered. ‘I’m just not a huge fan of being locked up, that’s all.’
‘Clearly. But why not?’
He set his jaw. ‘Who is?’
‘Plenty of people.’
‘Well, I’m not one of them.’
She bit her lip and frowned, her gaze turning far too probing for his comfort. Long seconds passed before she spoke again. ‘You flinch every time you come into my shop, I’ve never seen you get into a lift and you’d rather walk than take a taxi.’
It was a statement rather than a question and Will felt too sapped of energy to argue. Instead he avoided her eyes and muttered, ‘Yes, well, automatic locking mechanisms aren’t really my thing.’
‘So what is it? Claustrophobia?’
He heard the curiosity in her voice and gritted his teeth. ‘Cleithrophobia actually, but it’s not as bad as that. It’s not a phobia. It’s just a minor thing I have a slight problem with.’
‘If you say so,’ she said and he heard the hint of a smile in her voice. ‘What’s cleithrophobia?’
‘The fear of being locked in an enclosed space.’ He stifled a shudder. ‘I don’t particularly enjoy being locked in any space, enclosed or otherwise.’
‘I see. I’m sorry.’
‘It’s fine.’
Another few heartbeats of silence followed and Will wondered if he could hope that that was it. But then she said, ‘So what happened?’ and his stomach plummeted.
‘What do you mean, what happened?’ He tensed and stared fixedly at the ceiling.
‘Well, something must have caused it. In the first place, I mean.’
He closed his eyes as if somehow that might deter her from asking any more annoyingly persistent questions, and said vaguely, ‘I don’t really remember.’
Bella let out a soft ‘you don’t fool me’ kind of a laugh and then pressed herself closer. ‘Maybe I could help.’
‘I doubt it.’
‘Try me.’
Will opened his eyes and stared at her. ‘Are you going to let this go?’
‘I’d rather not, but I can’t make you tell me if you don’t want to.’ She shot him a shrewd look. ‘Of course your reluctance to talk about it could lead me to believe that it’s not quite as trivial as you’d like me to think.’
Will narrowed his eyes at her. Perhaps she had a point. Irritatingly enough. And then he felt something inside him deflate. Oh, what the hell? If she was interested enough to want to know, then he’d tell her. What was such a big deal about it anyway? It wasn’t as if it were that huge a part of his life.