“You can what? Invite me up to your room?”
I swallow hard. He knows I can’t do that. “I could call you.”
“I need more than that from you. I need—”
“What?” I whisper, feeling lost and seriously lacking in experience. What is it a man wants from a woman? I offered him my virginity, and he turned it down, but he seems frustrated.
“You should know better than to talk to someone like me. You should be afraid of me. And most of all, you shouldn’t trust me.” He runs a hand through his hair. “I’m not making sense.”
Stupid tears sting my eyes, and I force myself to lean back. He’s not really scaring me, but he’s definitely hurting my feelings. “Fine. I know better now. Happy?”
Gold flashes in those green eyes. He looks haunted, like the ghosts that wander the halls of the Louvre at night when everyone is gone. “No. I’m not happy. I should be, but I’m not.”
CHAPTER FIVE
I take the small elevator back up to the fourth floor and let myself into the suite using the key card. Downstairs has the eating area, the wet bar, the master bedroom.
And my father, sitting at a table, nursing a drink.
Mom stands from the sofa. “Holly,” she says with a warm smile. She looks soft and loving, the way she always does, even though I’ve clearly just broken the rules. “I knew you’d be back home safely. And at such a reasonable hour. Well before curfew.”
I’m frozen in the foyer, unable to take farther steps inside. “The Catacombs?”
Mom makes a face. “You were right. The bones were gross.”
Dad takes a sip of his amber drink and says nothing.
She gives me a kiss on my forehead. “Your sister’s already asleep. And I’m tired. Just wanted to say good night to you. Don’t go too hard on your father. He only wants you safe.”
Then I’m left alone with the man who raised me, the man I trust the most, love the most—and the man who’s most intimidating. Only London has ever brought men home, and they’ve always been terrified. He’s never hurt me, never raised a hand to me. Never even yelled, but then again, I’ve never broken a rule. That’s always been my sister’s job.
I sit at the glass table across from him. “Would it help my case to point out that I did actually get home before midnight?”
He doesn’t look impressed. “Curfew only applies to home. Your mom only said that so I wouldn’t be furious with you.”
My heart drops. “Are you? Furious?”
“Ah, Holly bear. You were my little girl. My baby. And then I come back to the hotel to find that you went out, no note, no message, nothing.”
I manage not to glance at my phone. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“Evie convinced me not to,” he says, glancing at the bedroom door where my mother’s probably getting ready for bed. Don’t be too hard on your father, she said. As if I have the power. “She said you’d be home by curfew, and that we could trust you.”
Guilt sears my insides because they can’t trust me. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“Where did you go?”
Frantically I try to think of something, but I really am a terrible liar. My mind conjures up things like I climbed the outside of the Eiffel Tower. Or I went to an underground poker ring. Not believable. Not better than the truth, either. “I went out with a boy I met at the museum.”
He pauses for a moment. Nods. The action reminds me of Elijah, actually. They don’t look alike, but they share a kind of decisiveness. A quiet strength. “His name?”
“Elijah.” I flush as I realize I don’t know his last name. I let him kiss me and considered doing more with him, without knowing his last name. He told the restaurant Smith but somehow I doubt that’s his real name.
“Did you think what would have happened if you disappeared? If he took you to some private place, drugged you, hurt you? We wouldn’t even have known where to look.”
My stomach turns over. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want you to be scared of the world. Evie was raised that way, and it made her more vulnerable to the dangers, not less. But you also have to understand that there are dangers.”
“My mother trusted you, and that wasn’t a mistake.” They met when she was on a road trip, and he worked as a trucker. It was love at first sight, and they drove together to Niagara Falls. They’ve told the story to me and London.
He looks grim. “Yes, it really was.”
Elijah’s words come back to me, and I shiver. You should know better than to talk to someone like me. You should be afraid of me. And most of all, you shouldn’t trust me.
He sighs. “Your mother was lucky she lived, being off on her own. But she didn’t have a family who loved her. Her mother put the fear of God in her, tried to keep her locked up tight. I don’t want to do that to you, but I also have a need to protect you.”
