Sold to the Man Who Took Me, but I Hold His Life novel · Chapter 5 of 24

Chapter 5: Say It

I waited until he was at the counter.

It was past midnight and the kitchen had one lamp on.

He stood the way he always stood, with his back to the hall and one hand flat on the wood.

He was eating cold chicken off a plate with a fork.

I had come down the stairs in my old gray sweatshirt with the key in my fist.

I stopped in the kitchen doorway.

"Miss Dunleavy." He did not turn around. "I'll go."

"Don't," I said.

"I said I'd not be in a room you're in," Declan said.

"I'm asking you to be," I said.

He put the fork down very slowly.

"You said unless I asked you," I said. "I'm asking. Turn around."

He turned.

His face was tired, and it gave nothing away.

I walked across the kitchen until I was close enough to see the scar through his eyebrow.

I could see the pulse going in the side of his neck.

I stopped an arm's length away.

I could smell soap and cold air.

"Say it," I said.

"Say what?"

"What you did. Say it out loud. I've been in this house four days and every kind thing you do is another way of not saying it."

He looked at me for a long moment.

"There's a tuition receipt," I said, "and a lock on my door, and a hallway that's always empty when I come down."

"That isn't why," Declan said.

"You carried a door out of the Starlite on your shoulder," I said. "You're very good at making sure I never have to be in the same air as you."

He did not answer.

"Then tell me why," I said. "Say what you did to me."

He swallowed.

I watched him do it.

"On the third of November," Declan said, "I went into the back office of the Starlite after the late show. You were in there. You were counting tips at the desk."

I did not move.

"I had been drinking. That is not a reason, and I am not giving it as one."

His voice was low, and it did not shake.

"I came in and I shut the door and I stood in front of it. You told me to move. You told me no. You said it more than once, and I heard you."

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