“A stalker, you mean.”
“If you prefer that label.” He wraps a hand around mine, pinning it on his chest. “You’re still shaking. Would you like me to drop the subject and let you go back to your safe cocoon like Little Miss Ostrich—”
“I didn’t want to kill myself.” I cut him off. “Yes, I’ve thought about it often, when the pain gets to be too much and I want it to just stop, but I still wouldn’t do it, because I’d regret it. I’d feel shitty for putting my family and friends through that, and maybe it wouldn’t work. What if the pain doesn’t stop, after all? What if it becomes tenfold worse?”
“You won’t feel anything postmortem.”
I snort, actually feeling light for talking to a heartless monster about it instead of someone who’d be hurt by my words. “Is that your idea of consolation?”
“I don’t know how to do that, but here’s what I do know.” He strokes my hand that’s beneath his. “I’ll make sure you never have those thoughts again.”
“Says the one who asked me to throw myself off a cliff so he could take a picture of my fall.”
“But you didn’t. As you said, you don’t want to kill yourself, and I believe you.”
My lips part. He…what?
Why would he believe me? Even I don’t believe myself sometimes. There’s an unreliable narrator in my head who keeps flinging me in all directions.
Forget it.
I’m simply not getting trapped in the web Killian is spinning.
Trying to remain nonchalant, I remove my hand from his hold. “Can you let me finish the initiation now?”
He taps a finger against his thigh. “Why are you so interested in joining our club?”
“Isn’t that where all the cool kids go?”
“Nice try, but no, it obviously isn’t your scene.”
“Because I’m a girl?”
“And a nerd and a scaredy-cat and an introvert. You name it.”
“I…can change.”
“Why?”
“What do you mean why?”
“Why would you change? You’re fine the way you are.”
My breath gets caught at the back of my throat. I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean it as a compliment, which is why it sounds even more like a compliment. Dammit.
The effect he has on me isn’t funny anymore.
“I just want to join the club and add more fun to my life.”
“I’ll be all the fun you need.”
“Arrogant prick.”
“Heard worse.”
“Come on, let me join.”
“No.”