I reacted on instinct, bolting to my feet and my gaze flying toward the door. I wanted to run. But if I did, my bluff would be called, and Macalister would fire me. He’d put up with a lot from me already—more than I had expected him to. And I’d come into this knowing that in order to achieve my goals, I’d likely have to sacrifice something.
Pride wasn’t that valuable to me, anyway.
A sigh seeped from my chest. “We slept together last year. It didn’t,” I struggled with how to put it, “really go that great.”
He sobered and seemed surprised. “The sex was bad?”
“Like, everything was bad.” My face had to be a million shades of red because it was on fire. “Tate’s girlfriend had just broken up with him, and we ran into each other at some stupid party. He was kind of drunk, and maybe I was too.” I wasn’t, but I wanted to save what little face I could. “He was single and lonely, so when I saw the opportunity, I took it.”
It was strange how he looked at me. There wasn’t judgment, only curiosity. “You seduced him.”
“Yeah,” I answered, my voice clipped. “I mean, it didn’t take much. He was horny, and he didn’t really care who he was with that night.”
“But you cared.” There was a gravel in Macalister’s voice that made goosebumps pebble on my forearms.
I tugged the corner of my mouth into a sad smile. “Yeah, I cared a lot.” I used nervous fingers to brush my hair back behind an ear. “So, anyway, the sex was awful. Like I said, he’d been drinking, and I’d wanted that moment for so long, I had all these expectations that were totally unrealistic. But it was just so awkward.” I winced as I remembered our fumbling frustration, followed by Tate falling asleep on me. “In the morning, he was hungover and miserable, which meant he wasn’t exactly subtle about how much of a mistake he thought he’d made with me.”
I fiddled with the pleating on the side of my dress while my gaze drifted down to Macalister’s black dress shoes.
“That was really hard,” I said, “and I didn’t handle it well. I gave him this big speech, like a fucking idiot, about how much I loved him. I’d thought if I just laid it all out there, he’d—”
“Fall in love with you.” Macalister turned to stone.
I nodded. He understood somehow.
There was a long hesitation before he finally broke the painful silence stretched between us.
“Perhaps,” uncertainty hazed his eyes, “you can take some comfort in the fact you did not give him this speech on his wedding day.”
Confusion nearly made a laugh climb out of me, but it died when the meaning of his statement slammed into me.
Holy shit.
He’d done the same thing? Confessed everything to Marist out of hopes she’d fall for him?
One of my hands went to my mouth, covering the worst of my gasp. “You didn’t.”
“Oh, I did.” He grimaced. “It was . . . poorly received.”
That had to be an enormous understatement, and I couldn’t stop the short sound—too joyless to be a laugh—that it punched from my lungs. I remembered the morning of her wedding when he’d blown into her room like a storm and demanded a moment alone with the bride. After he’d left her, Marist had been as white as her dress.
“Does it help,” I asked, “to know that she’s happy?” Because knowing that Tate would rather be alone than with me had been crushing.
“Yes,” he answered simply. “It makes it easier.”
Either he’d crept closer during our conversation or I’d drifted mindlessly toward him, because only a foot separated me from Macalister now, and I peered up at him with unasked questions crowding my eyes.
Was he over her?
Did he want to move on?
Had he spent every available minute today thinking about what I tasted like, as I’d done with him?
His gaze traced over my face so slowly, he had to be studying and cataloguing every inch with his icy eyes. It was hypnotic, and I sighed softly as he pushed closer. This time I didn’t try to run from him. The room was stifling, filled completely by him, but I didn’t mind.
His voice was velvet as he tipped his head down, his lips drawing near. “You don’t have to tell me your secret tonight. Just give me the name.”
It was like being ripped from a cozy hot tub in the dead of winter, the way he took me from my dreamy spell to the harsh reality. He’d tried to use his power to manipulate the secret from me, and Christ, it’d nearly worked. I stumbled backward, eager to put distance between myself and the heat he could generate in a single look.
“No,” I snapped.
Gone was the seduction from a moment ago, replaced by the cold, irritated demeanor he’d had when he first arrived home. “I suggest you save us both the time and stop fighting what’s inevitable. This isn’t a battle you’re going to win.”