“No,” I say, rage building inside me again. “No way. You don’t give a shit about my health. You”—I point at her—“you’re up to something. First the drugs on the plane, and now this. You’re trying to kill me, Nazeera, and I don’t understand why.
“What happened? You didn’t finish the job the first time? You came back to make sure I was dead? Was that it?”
Slowly, she gets to her feet, but she can’t meet my eyes.
Her silence is driving me crazy.
“I want answers,” I cry, shaking with fury. “Right now. I want to know what the hell you’re doing. I want to know why you’re here. I want to know who you’re working for.” And then, practically screaming the words: “And I want to know why you were in my goddamn room tonight.”
“Kenji,” she says quietly. “I’m sorry. I’m not good at this. That’s all I can tell you. I’m sorry.”
I’m so shocked by her gall I actually flinch in response.
“Truly, I’m sorry,” she says again. She’s backing away from me. Slowly, but still—I’ve seen this girl run. “Let me just go die of humiliation somewhere else, okay? I’m so sorry.”
“Stop.”
She goes suddenly still.
I try to steady my breathing. Can’t. My chest is still heaving when I say, “Just tell me the truth.”
“I told you the truth,” she says, anger flaring in her eyes. “I’m not good at this, Kenji. I’m not good at this.”
“What are you talking about? Of course you’re good at this. Murdering people is, like, your life’s work.”
She laughs, but she sounds a little hysterical. “Do you remember,” she says, “when I told you that this could never work?” She makes that familiar motion, that gesture between our bodies. “Do you remember that day?”
Something unconscious, something primal I can’t control, sends a sharp needle of heat through my body. Even now.
“Yes,” I say. “I remember.”
“This,” she says, waving her arms around. “This is what I was talking about.”
I frown. I feel like I’ve lost track of the conversation. “I don’t . . .” I frown again. “What are you talking about?”
“This,” she says, fury edging into her voice. “This. This. You don’t understand. I don’t know how to— I just don’t do this, okay? Ever. I tried to tell you that day that I don’t— But now—” She cuts herself off with a sharp shake of her head. Turns away. “Please don’t make me say it.”
“Say what?”
“That you’re—” She stops. “That this—”
I wait, and wait, and still, she says nothing.
“I what? This what?”
Finally, she sighs. Meets my eyes. “You were my first kiss.”
Eleven
I could’ve spent years trying to figure out what she was about to say to me, and I never would’ve gotten it right.
Never.
I’m beyond stunned. Beyond dumbfounded.
And all I can come up with is— “You’re lying.”
She shakes her head.
“But—”
She keeps shaking her head.
“I don’t understand.”
“I like you,” she says quietly. “A lot.”
Something flashes through me—something terrifying. A rush of feeling. A lick of fire. Joy. And then denial, denial, fast and hard.
“Bullshit.”
“Not bullshit,” she whispers.
“But you’ve been trying to kill me.”
“No.” She hangs her head. “I’ve been trying to show you I care.”
I can only stare at her, bewildered.
“I gave you a slightly stronger dose of that drug because I was so worried you’d wake up on the plane and get yourself murdered,” she says. “I was in your room tonight because I wanted to make sure you were okay, but when you woke up I got nervous and disappeared. And then you started talking, and the things you said were so beautiful that I just”—she shakes her head—“I don’t know. The truth is, I don’t have an excuse. I stayed because I wanted to stay. I stayed and I watched you like a creep, and when you caught me I was so mortified I nearly killed you for it.”
She covers her face with her hands.
“I have no idea what I’m doing,” she says, her words so small and quiet I have to step closer to hear them. “I’ve been prepared for literally every single other high-stress situation life can throw my way, but I have no idea how to properly reciprocate positive emotion. I was never shown how. Never taught how to do it. And, as a result, I’ve avoided it altogether.”