Chapter 23

Leona' s POV Atwood’s words echoed in my head long after he stopped speaking. Bar pickup. Carried home. My body went cold. I pulled the blanket tighter around myself and finally dared to look down. The clothes I was wearing were not the ones I remembered from the night before. Soft cotton. Clean. Someone else’s choice. My breath hitched. A thousand possibilities flooded my mind at once, each worse than the last. My chest tightened, panic crawling up my throat until my eyes burned. I didn’t want to ask. I was terrified of the answer. Atwood noticed immediately. He leaned back against the wall, arms crossed, that infuriatingly relaxed expression on his face, a crooked smile tugging at his lips. “What’s wrong?” he asked, though his eyes glittered as if he already knew. I couldn’t speak. My fingers curled into the blanket, knuckles white. The room felt too small, the air too thin. Ariel, on the other hand, saw everything. His gaze followed mine, landed on my clothes, and his entire posture