He had skimmed through not even one-fifth of the book when a guard walked into the library. He hadn’t seen us yet, but it was only a matter of time—we were enclosed in a glass room after all. “Adrian,” I hissed, and when his eyes didn’t look up from the pages, I nudged his ribs hard. My left hand immediately shot up, covering his mouth, while the right one tore out the page he had been reading. His eyes opened wide in disbelief of what I had just done.

“No time.” I dragged him out of the glassed-in room, where we were easily seen, and into the main part of the library.

He quickly grasped the situation and signaled me to follow him. We moved farther and farther away from the voices. Once we felt we were at a safe distance, we stopped against the back wall, the statue of Dionysus beside us. I leaned my hand on the statue’s thigh, wanting to rest for a moment to steady myself. But we heard a soft click and the bookcase behind us swung open to reveal a hidden room. The voices gained on us. Without thinking, I grabbed Adrian and shoved him inside before getting in myself and pulling the bookcase closed.

The hidden room turned out to be nothing more than an empty broom closet. Or so it seemed, anyway. I wondered what warranted the need for this room to be here. Moreover, why the hell was the hidden button on Dionysus’s thigh?

I was trying to distract myself from how hyperaware my body was that, for the second time today, there was so little space separating me from Adrian. Even without looking up, I could feel him watching me. The only thing that kept me standing there and not pooling on the floor as my knees weakened were those voices outside. They sounded so close, almost as if they were just on the other side of the door. What would we do if we were caught? What if Adrian’s Pure Royal pass did not include smuggling a Regular into sacred places after all?

I felt Adrian’s hand on the small of my back, the pressure was slow but inexorable, and suddenly it was all I could think about. I grew hot as our bodies inched even closer. I felt his soft breathing in my hair. His lips were inches away from my skin.

I stood perfectly still and didn’t dare look up into his emerald eyes. I knew if I did, I would drown in them and there would be no turning back. I would keep drowning and drowning. Even with the closeness of Adrian clouding my judgment, I knew our purpose here was more important than satisfying this burning desire rising from the pit of my stomach.