“I can’t,” Silas said, his eyes drawn back to me. “I’m sorry. I can’t promise that.”
“We can revert to the original rules,” Quillan countered. “Whatever you do to her, the rest of us can do. Keep that in mind.”
“Um,” I interrupted, shrugging out from beneath Cabe’s arm. “Do I have a say in this?”
“Depends on what your say is.” Quillan had the decency to look apologetic.
What was my say?
Crap.
I didn’t know what my say was.
“Let’s cut to the real issue,” Silas spoke up. “You’re worried that I’m using her. Well… I’m not. I didn’t want to bond to her—we all knew that—but I have her now. She’s mine. And I’m not going to abandon her or any of you. Weston can torture me every day for the rest of my life and it won’t change a thing. I don’t know how it’s going to work, and I know it won’t be easy… I considered leaving; I almost succeeded… but in the end, I couldn’t do it. So now I’m here.”
Silas and Quillan seemed to be locked into a stare-off, and I didn’t know how to take Silas’s little speech. It seemed that I had somehow won his loyalty when I traded myself for him, though I should have only won his anger for not having traded myself earlier. I leaned into Cabe, watching the other two, and he wrapped his arm around my shoulder again.
“Fine,” Quillan finally relented. “No more rules.”
“No sex,” Noah blurted.
Everyone turned to stare at him. Including me.
“What?” I choked.
“I just need…” he avoided looking at me, “time to… adjust. There are four of us. I expected to share, but…”
“No sex,” Silas agreed, shooting to his feet, his voice a snarl.
Quillan nodded, his jaw tight.
“Are you okay with this?” Cabe whispered to me.
“What if I want to have sex?” I replied, a little too loudly. They all turned to stare, and I quickly back-tracked, nervously raising my voice even more. “I mean… not that I do. I’m just saying… okay… never mind. So I don’t have to date other people anymore? We’re not still doing that?”
“No.” They all spoke in unison, and even Quillan looked aggravated at the question.
“Eesh.” I stumbled away from Cabe, and then took a few more steps away just to gain a bit more distance from the rest of them, too. “I think I’m done with this conversation. I’m going to bed.”
I climbed onto the mattress and reached over to turn the lamp off, but they were all still staring at me. Quillan now wore a shell-shocked expression, as though his own outburst had seriously unsettled him.
“Are you all just going to stand there?” I sighed.
“I’m not leaving.” Quillan strode over to my bed. He picked me up and moved me further into the middle so that he could sit on the edge, and then he seemed to be pulling his shoes off.
“What are you doing?” I asked slowly.
“Sleeping in your bed.” He was back in control of his tone, though I could still see the line of tension in his broad shoulders. “I don’t trust any of them to do it, so I’m going to do it. They can get the hell out or sleep on the floor.”
Noah and Cabe looked at each other, Cabe shrugging as they both started pulling mattresses out from beneath the bed. Silas moved to the other side and sat, beginning to unlace his boots. Apparently there were only two single mattresses.
“Cabe, switch with Silas,” Quillan ordered.
Silas smirked, standing and moving over to Cabe’s mattress on the ground. I realised that he had been anticipating the order, and he found it amusing. He caught me smiling and he winked at me, which caused a laugh to burst from my throat. I was pretty sure that Silas had never winked at me before. It didn’t surprise me as much as it should have that the more Quillan lost his composure, the more human Silas seemed to become.
Quillan finished with his shoes and tugged his shirt over his head, flashing me a bare torso ridged with muscle. He must have been finding time to exercise when I wasn’t around; probably in the mornings. He ripped off his belt, tossed it on the ground, and then couldn’t seem to decide what to do about his pants. In the end, he scowled and kept them on. I was smiling again and I couldn’t help it… until the others started to undress as well, and then I had to hide my face in my pillow from the sensory overload. Someone switched off the light after a few minutes, and a comfortable silence descended over the room, punctuated every now and then by a heavy sigh from Quillan. He grumbled whenever I rolled too close to him, but he also grumbled whenever I rolled too close to Cabe, so I ended up trying to make myself as small as possible between the two of them. Eventually, Quillan fell asleep and I managed to relax. Cabe caught me around the middle and pulled me back into his chest, breathing in deeply against my hair.