He turned on the stairs. “Why aren’t you in class?”
“Because I asked the driver whose damn name I still don’t know to bring me home so that I could say ‘what the hell, man!’ to the asshole who crashed my class!” she answered, slamming the door shut behind her.
She didn’t bother to take off her shoes, just came storming up the edge of the stairs to demand again, “What the hell was that?”
As always, his heart leaped at the sight of her. She’d gone back to wearing braids this semester. And though she was wearing a neon purple puffy coat, not a tee and sports shorts, this style made him recall the college girl who’d sat across from him in a Bentley ten years ago, right after Phantom had snatched her from her dorm room.
That, and the fury on her face.
“I brought you lunch,” he answered, keeping his face a careful blank as he walked down the stairs to come to a stand in front of her. “I thought you might be hungry.”
He designed his answer for maximum confusion and upset. And it worked.
Her eyes blazed at his answer. “You haven’t kissed me in ten years of marriage. Why did you do that? Why did you show up out of the blue and kiss me? In front of my whole class?”
He didn’t answer for a couple of reasons. The truth did not align with how he wanted her to perceive him. It wouldn’t do to let her know how jealous her hug with the Pittsburgh transfer student had made him. It would only cause him to lose face.
Also, silence had always been his best weapon. The perfect weapon. Adversaries backed down from arguments when you were silent. They changed the subject. Often, they talked too much to fill in the words you did not speak.
Victor knew the secrets of many of his friends and rivals alike simply because he never interrupted. It was the ultimate way to win arguments, he had found. How often had Phantom and Han let him have his way, simply because he refused to entertain their questions and counter suggestions?
As he stood before her, not answering, he recalled their first anniversary, when Dawn filled up all his silence with mostly one-sided conversation. Soothing herself to the point that she let her guard down and walked unsuspecting into the trap he had set.
But this time, she didn’t simply take his silence as she always had.
She balled her fists at her sides. “Answer me, you asshole! If you won’t leave, then at least answer my fucking questions! Why are you still here? Why did you do all that stuff for my mom, then bring me back here to torture me?”
Victor regarded her for a cold beat. Then he reminded her and himself, “I am your owner for four more months. I can do whatever I want. And I do not have to explain it to you.”
Dawn stared back at him, her expression enraged.
“All you do is mess with me!” she yelled, shoving him in the chest. Once, twice, three times. Not that it mattered. He didn’t move an inch. “You ruin everything, including my thesis presentation, which I can’t even attend because it’s on May 25th. So, of course, you’re not going to let me get my MFA. Because no matter how nice you were to my mother, you suck now, like, on a base level. I hate this! And I hate you!”
Good. Her shove had barely registered. And it delighted him to see her so frustrated.
She was so angry that she fisted her braids at each side of her head and walked away in the opposite direction. As if she might explode with anger if she continued to look at him.
He wanted her to hate him. Wanted her to rail against the things he did to her, not appreciate them and even thank him as she had over the weekend. That was what this was all about, he reminded himself. Punishing her. Making her hurt. What happened in Texas changed nothing about his original mission.
“I hate you so much! Ugh! Hate, hate, hate you!” she screamed with her back to him.
Then she surprised Victor by suddenly turning around and rushing toward him, her expression twisted with violent rage.
He made no move to defend himself. Her angry shoves had felt like little more than pats against his chest earlier. And it amused him that she would even attempt to engage him in physical combat.
So he let her come, allowed her to get in her pitiful hits.
But she didn’t hit him. At least not on the chest.
Her lips banged into his. And she attacked his closed mouth, licking and biting. Then she snaked a hand around his neck, her fingernails digging into the skin there like an animal who refused to let her prey get away.
