“I’m not your assistant, I’m your partner. You’ve said that so many times, or was that just a lie?”
He stabs a finger at his chest. “I’m the one who’s responsible. I’m the one who’ll have to live with it if something happens to you.”
“Not this again. When are you going to stop wrapping me in cotton wool?”
Suddenly Cale’s shouting. “I’m throwing fucking knives at you. How is that treating you like you’re wrapped in cotton wool?”
“You’re always setting the limits for the things we do and I have to push you every step of the way to change.” I start ticking things off on my fingers. “You don’t like our act, my catsuit isn’t appropriate, you won’t throw the last knife because of some superstition you have.”
“I look out for you. I look out for everyone here. It’s what I do.”
“You don’t have to look out for me. I’m not a child. I’m eighteen now.”
“That doesn’t change anything.”
“Liar. It means next time you kiss me you don’t have to pretend it never happened.”
Cale’s face goes blank. All anger, all self-righteousness, gone. Like someone snapped out a light. “I never kissed you.”
“Liar,” I say again, but this time it’s a whisper. It was easier when we were shouting. “I felt you—” I take a painful swallow. “I felt you kiss me back.”
I wish I could take back the words as soon as they’re out of my mouth. I’ve turned eighteen and apparently I think I know anything about the way kissing is supposed to feel.
He just stares at me, and I know I don’t have the courage to talk about the kiss anymore. “Would you really hurt yourself with the sixth knife if you hurt me?”
He shifts on his feet, and the shadows move across his face, making it hard to discern what he’s thinking. Wordlessly, he nods.
I don’t want any more safeguards between us. I don’t want a backup plan or an Option B. I don’t want Cale to imagine that one slip will mean he loses everything.
That he’s all alone in this.
“I was talking to your mother and—”
Cale groans and presses the heels of his hands to his forehead, and my stomach somersaults like Dandelion has thrown me. I’ve got it all wrong, and now I’ve ruined the best friendship I’ve ever had.
“She said she wouldn’t tell you,” he says quietly. He turns away and I can barely see him in the darkness.
I frown in confusion. She didn’t tell me anything at all, really. Be patient with Cale. He has a hard time with these sorts of things. He has trouble admitting things to himself that others see very easily.
“Tell me what?”
“How I feel about you.”
My stomach somersaults back the other way. I go to Cale and put a tentative hand on his shoulder. He’s clenched so tightly that his muscle is as hard as iron beneath my touch. “Cale? How do you feel about me?”
Cale’s silence is probably the most terrifying thing I’ve ever experienced, and I’ve run from a man wielding a shotgun.
He rubs his brow feverishly but doesn’t turn to face me. The moonlight from the open tent flap drenches his shoulders, making him seem otherworldly and far beyond my reach. “Go and stand against the board.”
I stare at the back of his head, not understanding. “I…”
“I said, go and stand against the board.”
Even taking one step away from him feels like torture, but I have to trust that him sending me to the board means he’s going to come, too.
I force my legs not to shake as I walk back into the lit arena. A moment later, Cale follows me. His jaw is tight and his face is pale. I can’t tell if he’s angry or scared. Maybe both.
He shrugs out of his jacket and throws it aside, revealing the leather holster he wears with his knives close to his ribs, the handles gleaming under the spotlight. Wordlessly, he pulls two out and holds them in each hand. He examines the blade of one of them solemnly, as if evaluating its merits. A choice lies before him, one he’s not going to make lightly.