"Medusa." His deep voice turned scornful as he rasped out "I would talk with you all day and all night."

I shot him a small grateful smile as he moved closer until our shoulders touched.

"What happened yesterday?" He tried to ask gently but his voice came out rough and demanding.

"It was nothing." I waved him off.

"It was not fucking nothing. Something that makes you upset is not fucking nothing to me." He growled out his words like they hurt him to say, "I was worried about you."

I offered him a small smile as I questioned "Really?"

"Ella." He breathed out, sternly yet softly.

"My dad doesn’t live here with me." I admitted while avoiding his gaze.

Stone went silent for a second.

His fixed dark gaze never left my face when he spoke again "I thought as much."

I turned my head to the side and upwards so that I could meet his eye as I asked, "How could you have possibly known that?"

"You are a terrible liar." He mentioned with a rough sounding sigh.

"Maybe you are just psychic or something." I spoke absentmindedly "I've convinced Lana that he is still around for about a year now."

I realised what I had said as soon as I said it, but it was too late to take it back.

"You have done what?" The giant on my bed grumbled.

"I don't want to worry her." I rambled out my explanation "I feel really bad about lying to her, but I just don't want to see the look of pity on her face."

Stone did not speak for a while. He just sat there and studied me. His jaw ticked and the veins in his neck bulged while he watched me deep in thought.

"What is going on, Medusa?"

If there was one thing that I knew for definite in this world, then it was that I was a stubborn person, and he was also a stubborn person.

My gut feeling told me that Stone would not push me for an explanation if I was not ready to talk about it.

The scary thing was that I wholeheartedly wanted to open up to him.

I cleared my throat and spoke "When my mom died last year, it was really hard for me, but it was much harder for my dad. I know that grief is different for everyone, but he was a whole other level of messed up. Alcohol was his only comfort. He even showed up to her funeral wasted..."

He watched intently as I paused my story to take a breath. He then offered me a small twitch of his lip.

I understood the tiny movement of his mouth as a smile of reassurance to continue my story.