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Ella sent hi ‘You don’t need to send ood at turning the tables, You haven’t said one word about your own inappropriate behaviour, except to inals purely to rile me’

Aristandros laughed out loud, the unexpected sound of his a the tense atmosphere in the room ‘Not to rile you’

‘I don’t give a da the case shut and closing it

‘Liar,’ Aristandros framed silkily ‘For a woht’

Ella went rigid, shot hi the case down She was so s at hi jealous? How dared he have the power to divine feelings she had not even ade, he cut across her path and snatched the case off her ‘What the heck do you think you’re doing?’ she shouted at him

‘I’ very stupid,open the door of the dressing roo crash

‘I’ to take whatever you throw at her!’ Ella flung at hih her veins andit impossible for her to stay still or even think with any rationality ‘I’m not interested in youryou could give ave ht!’

‘Even if I admit that the only woantly back against the door to close it ‘Yes, I conducted an experiht, I wanted a reaction’

‘An experiment?’ Ella parrotted with raw incredulity

‘A haret so worked up at the sight ofwith another woman’

Her sli round inside her that she felt frighteningly violent, and yet terrifyingly vulnerable at the same time

‘But that’s all that I did,’ Aristandros continued steadily ‘Nothing else’

The hard truth of that stateh to knock her off her feet So he had danced with another wo deal! Social interactions of that ilk were normal at parties What had made her overreact to such an extent? Why did she feel like rage was ready to explode out of her because she couldn’t contain it? He had wanted a reaction and she had given it to him Only a very possessive woman…And in spite of all her denials she was possessive, wasn’t she? Violently possessive, with feelings and responses born fro at photos of Ari with other woested it was an unhealthy obsession, and so it was, for it had fostered a bone-deep streak of jealousy that she had not even recognised for what it was

‘Maybe I overreacted’ Ella voiced those words as though they were coe she found hard to pronounce It was an acknowledgement of folly which cost her pride dear For ain horror at the raging mindless jealousy that had consumed her and almost persuaded her to burn every one of her boats Had she truly been willing to sacrifice Callie in that conflagration as well? She was genuinely appalled

The silence stretched, drawn tight by her strain

Ella focused on Ari’s lean, classic profile, her nervous tension at an incredible high He had set her up to see how she would react to his flirtation, and he would have had to torture her to get an apology out of her She hated hi that what he had made her feel scared her Suddenly she did not want to probe the precise nature and cause of the madness that had overpowered her coes in my life—have been an incredible strain,’ she said instead, her low voice tight and stilted, because her pride was cringing at the excuse she was using

‘Of course,’ Aristandros breathed with an alreement of that explanation that took her aback

She was standing beside a mirror, and she looked at herself The illusion of perfection was gone now, replaced by tousled hair, sht at a rock concert

‘Sometimes I push too hard’ Aristandros murmured that concession without any expression at all ‘But don’t ever walk out on ain’