The Cyber Twins novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: Something in This Room

Gia put her finger to her lips and unlocked the door.

"Go home," she said, loud enough for the hall. "You look green, Wynne. I'll tell Papà you got sick from the diesel."

In a whisper she added, "Jillian won't hear a thing from me."

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me. Fix it."

Jillian was standing outside Gia's office with two coffees, the way she always did.

"Feeling better?" she said, and held one out.

I took it, and I drank it, and I smiled.

"Much," I said. "Thanks, Jillian."

Her eyes went to my hands, then to my coat.

I walked past her, down the hall and out into the cold, and I did not look back.

At the penthouse I showered and sat on the edge of the bed in a towel, with the drive in my fist.

I was still sitting there when the front door opened at six.

Nico came into the bedroom with his jacket over his arm and his hair wrecked.

He stopped in the doorway.

"You waited up."

"Couldn't sleep."

He set the jacket on a chair.

"I was a jerk at the docks," he said. "In front of my father. In front of everyone."

"Yes."

"I don't want you in that room, Wynne. I don't want any of that to touch you. That's all it is."

"I know that's what you think."

"It's not what I think. It's what I know."

He crossed the room in three steps and knelt in front of me.

He put both hands on my knees.

"I'm sorry," he said, and I believed that he was.

It wasn't enough.

But I had wanted him since the study, and since before the study, and I was tired of being the only quiet one in my own bed.

I stood up.

The towel dropped.

Keep reading free with an account. Start The Cyber Twins from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.