She was afraid to move. Whatever drug the nurse had given her was actually beginning to work and she didn’t feel like screaming in pain for the first time since she’d become aware. She didn’t want that agony to come back. That meant staring into Elijah’s eyes, eyes that changed color continually, one moment light mercury and the next as dark as night. Her breath caught in her throat. He needed a haircut, but the need suited him, giving him a disheveled, sexy look that went with his handsome face. He was a beautiful man, with his black tee stretched across his heavily muscled chest and his jeans fitting his narrow hips and tight butt perfectly.

He was breathtaking. She didn’t want him to look at her, and she certainly didn’t want to meet his eyes. She couldn’t. The worst I’ve ever had. His words were burned into her brain.

“Don’t, Siena,” he said softly, as if he could read her thoughts. “I was full of shit, saying those things to you. I fucked up. I know that. You know that. We have to move past that because we both know I’m not going anywhere.”

She stared at the wall just over his head.

“Siena. I told you I fucked up. I’m saying we need to move past it.”

Something inside her broke. She wanted to leap at him, anger moving through her humiliation. “Move past it? Exactly what should I move past, Elijah? Move past the things you said to me? Sorry, the things you said can’t be unsaid. Move past the fact that you shoved me out a door naked when I was in shock? I don’t think there is moving past those things. Please leave before I call security.”

“I am your security,” he snapped. “No one is going to throw me out, baby, least of all you. You’re going to have to come to terms with that fact. You know everything I said to you was bullshit, so move on.”

“Oh. My. God.” She forgot about the pain—probably because it had subsided—and she lifted her head, glaring at him. “You are so arrogant. And idiotic. Seriously idiotic if you think I’m just going to forget what you said to me. I can repeat it word for word if you like.”

“I wouldn’t like,” he said, his eyes nearly glowing at her as if he had every right to be angry. “And lie down before you hurt yourself.”

“You can stop giving me orders and get out of my room.”

He put a hand on her shoulder and applied pressure until she had no choice but to subside against the pillow. For a moment satisfaction gleamed in his eyes. She saw the leopard there, and she knew he was one of them. She knew it. His temper. His arrogance. The sheer power he exuded just walking into a room.