Every step is a lesson in self-control as I have to force myself not to look back over my shoulder to see if Jaxon is still watching me. The prickle at the back of my neck says he is, but I ignore it.

Just like I ignore the weird feeling inside me that has shown up every time I’ve seen him. I assure myself it’s nothing, that it doesn’t matter. Because no way am I about to crush on a boy this complicated.

Still, the urge to turn around stays with me—right up until Jaxon appears by my side, eyes gleaming with interest and sexy-af hair blowing in the wind.

“What’s the rush?” he asks, scooting in front of me so that he’s directly in my path, walking backward so we’re face-to-face and I’m forced to slow down or bump into him.

“Nothing.” I look down so I don’t have to look him in the eye. “I’m cold.”

“So which is it? Nothing?” He stops walking, which forces me to do the same, then puts a finger under my chin and presses up until I relent and meet his gaze. He flashes me a crooked little smile that does unspeakable things to my heart—the whole reason I’d been trying not to look at him to begin with. Especially considering what I just saw between him and Lia. “Or the cold?”

If I look closely, I can still see the imprint of her hand on his scarred cheek. It pisses me off, more than it should considering I barely know the guy. Which is why I take a deliberate step to the side and say, “The cold. So if you’ll excuse me…”

“You’re wearing an awful lot of clothes,” he tells me—confirming that I look as ridiculous as I feel—as he moves until he’s once again in front of me. “You sure the cold’s not just an excuse?”

“I don’t need to make excuses to you.” And yet I am—making excuses and trying to run away from him and what I just saw. Trying to run away from all the things he makes me feel when all I really want to do is grab on to him and hold on tight. It’s an absurd thought, an absurd feeling, but that doesn’t make it any less real.

He tilts his head, quirks a brow, and somehow has my heart beating that much faster because of it. “Don’t you?”

This is the part where I should start walking. The part where I should do a lot of things, anything, that doesn’t involve throwing myself at Jaxon Vega like I’m the game-deciding pitch at the World Series. But I don’t do that.

Instead, I stay where I am. Not because Jaxon is blocking my way—which he is—but because everything inside me is responding to everything inside him. Even the danger. Especially the danger, though I’ve never been that girl before, the one who takes risks just to see how they feel.

Maybe that’s why—instead of moving around him and running back to the castle like I should—I look him straight in the eye and say, “No. I don’t answer to you.”

He laughs. He actually laughs, and it’s the most arrogant thing I’ve ever heard.

“Everyone answers to me…eventually.”

Oh. My. God. What an asshat.

I roll my eyes and step around him, moving up the path with a stiff back and a fast pace that all but screams for him not to follow. Because when he says stuff like that, it doesn’t matter how drawn to him I feel. I’ve got better things to do than waste my time on a guy who thinks he’s God’s gift to everyone.

Except Jaxon must not be as adept at reading body language as I thought—or he just doesn’t care. Either way, he doesn’t let me go like I expect. Instead, he starts walking right alongside me again, keeping pace no matter how hard and fast I push myself.

It’s annoying af, even without the obnoxious smirk he doesn’t try to hide. Or the multiple sidelong glances that precede the words: “Hanging out with Flint Montgomery isn’t exactly keeping your head down.”

I ignore him, do my best Dory impression. Just keep walking, just keep walking.

“I’m only saying,” he continues when I don’t respond, “making friends with a dra—” He breaks off, clears his throat before trying again. “Making friends with a guy like Flint is…”

“What?” I turn on him, frustration racing through me. “Being friends with Flint is what exactly?”

“Like painting a target on your back,” he answers, looking a little taken aback by my anger. “It’s pretty much the opposite of keeping a low profile.”

“Oh, really? So what exactly is hanging out with you, then?”

His face goes blank, and I don’t think he’s going to answer. But eventually, he says, “Utter and complete stupidity.”

Not the answer I was expecting, especially from someone as arrogant and annoying as he can be. The blunt honesty of it slips past my defenses, though. Has me answering when I didn’t think there was anything else to say. “Yet here you are.”

“Yeah.” His dark, bemused eyes search my face. “Here I am.”

Silence echoes between us—dark, loaded, unfathomable—even as tension stretches taut as a circus high wire.

I should go.

He should go.

Neither of us moves. I’m not sure I even breathe.

Finally, Jaxon breaks the stillness—though not the tension—by taking a step closer to me. Then another and another, until the only thing that separates us is the bulky weight of my coat and the thinnest sliver of air.

Chills that have nothing to do with the cold and everything to do with Jaxon’s proximity dance up and down my spine.

My heart pounds.

My head swims.

My mouth goes desert dry.

And the rest of me doesn’t fare much better…especially when Jaxon reaches for my gloved hand, rubs his thumb back and forth across my palm.

“What were you and Flint talking about?” he asks after a second. “At the party?”

“I honestly don’t remember.” Which sounds like a cop-out answer, but it’s really just the truth. With Jaxon touching me, I’m lucky to remember my own name.

He doesn’t challenge my words. But the corners of his lips tip up in a very self-satisfied smile as he murmurs, “Good.”

His smirk jump-starts my brain—finally—and then it’s my turn to ask a question. “What were you and Lia fighting about?”

I don’t know what I expect—his gaze to go flat again, probably, or for him to tell me that it’s none of my business. Instead, he says, “My brother,” in a tone that doesn’t ask for sympathy and warns that he won’t permit it.

It’s not the answer I was expecting, but as the very few pieces I have start fitting themselves together in my head, my heart plummets. “Was…was Hudson your brother?”