She landed on her side on the couch and curled in a ball, clutching her throat and coughing, glaring up at him as he paced away from her.

He shoved an angry hand through his hair, before turning back to her and pointing. “I want his full name and address.”

She shook her head, paling. “No, I can’t give it to you. I-I don’t even know it.”

“Liar,” he said accusingly.

She flinched, but he didn’t come near her. Judging by his agitated body language, she thought maybe he was keeping his distance so he wouldn’t hurt her again.

She touched tentative fingers to her neck and swallowed experimentally. Her throat felt hot and scratchy. Raw. Like she’d been screaming through a tube.

“I swear I’m not lying,” she insisted. “I was seventeen. I’d had a crush on him for ages and we were at a party together after high school graduation. We were heading to different colleges and I knew it was my last chance to kiss him.” The words came out in a rush and she couldn’t tell from the stillness of his body and his penetrating stare whether he believed her. “One kiss led to another, led to us ending up in the host’s bedroom. We had sex on a pile of coats and purses. I didn’t like it and wasn’t sorry when he left town.”

Volkan seemed to visibly relax, his shoulders dropping and his hands unclenching. She flinched back and held her hands up protectively as he strode toward her, but he only dropped to his knees in front of her. Even kneeling, he towered over her. He reached up her thighs, took hold of her skirt and gently twisted it back into place, smoothing it down.

A sob escaped her throat and she had the sudden urge to throw herself into his arms and beg him to hold her. Stockholm, her brain whispered at her. One second, he was terrorizing her and the next showing kindness. Of course she wanted to lap up any drop of kindness he would show her. It was a messed-up situation and she couldn’t tell if he was engineering the whole thing or if he really was as unhinged as he seemed.

He reached for her face, holding her and using his thumbs to wipe the tears from beneath her eyes. The move was so unexpectedly gentle that she was unprepared for his words. “You’re lying to me about his name, Yasmin. No one forgets the name of the first person they fucked. Not even if the sex was bad and you never want to see him again. You’ll give me that name or I will go hunting and it’ll be so much worse for him when I find him.”