Page 49 of Folds
“If I lose control,” he says quietly, “This doesn’t stay… this.”
He gestures to himself vaguely with his free hand.
“I’ve already seen Rowan. What I need to know is what it means. Maybe you could start with what you are?”
His thumb presses lightly against my pulse point, as though he’s measuring something. After a few seconds, he lets his hand drop to my waist, apparently satisfied. I notice he seems to need to be touching me at all times, like now that we’ve finally broken that thin veil of friendship and civility, he’s making up for lost time.
I feel the same.
I shake my head slightly, trying to keep the lust at bay just long enough to get at least one straight answer out of him.
“You’re right, but it’s not so cut and dried. I’m more night than human. It’s a family trait,” he replies with a shrug.
That almost makes me laugh.
“Rowan,” I sigh, reaching out to rest my hand on his chest. “You’re not giving me a lot to work with, and yet I still want you.”His eyes darken, and I can tell he believes me. I feel it in the way his control slips for just a second and the way the air around us shifts.
“You don’t understand what you’re asking.”
“Then make me understand.”
There’s too long of a pause as his gaze searches mine, sharp and assessing, cataloguing my reactions for hesitation. Fear. Anything he can use to justify walking away.
He doesn’t find it.
“Not here,” he says finally, the words rougher now, strained at the edges. “Once you know everything… just, not here.”
A slow, steady heat curls low in my stomach.
“Take me where you want to go.”
His hand slides from my waist back up my body, then more focused as he traces the long line of my neck to my chin, his thumb brushing languorously across my bottom lip like he’s memorizing it.
“You have no idea what you’re agreeing to,” he murmurs.
“Probably not.”
I don’t look away.
“Still, yes.”
absence of light
We walk in comfortable silence for a few blocks. I don’t have to clarify to know where we are going. I’d feel the pull to Hill House no matter where I was, though that pull is duller now. The magnetic insistence of my obsession focuses more on the man, or whatever he is, beside me.
“Is Sarah,” I search for the words “Like you?”
He shakes his head slightly.
“No, I’ve never met anyone like me besides my mom. Sarah is a witch, though. She knows what I am.” I shouldn’t feel that sting at all, but it does.
“Did you think I wouldn’t keep your secret?”
Another shake.
“No. There’s not really a secret to keep, amongst the locals anyway.”
I nod to myself pensively. I’ve seen enough people interact with Rowan to have been able to guess that. He’s beloved here. It makes sense that the outsider trying to stumble onto his secret would be systematically blocked. Sucks if you’re the outsider, though.
