“Hey, where are you off to?” Jordan called when I headed for the door.
“I have to take care of something.”
“But we’re having fun.”
“I’ll be back in a bit.” I opened the door and the icy air felt like a balm to my heated face. Outside, the night was quiet, and heavy clouds hung in the sky. My legs were a little unsteady as I walked to the main building, but that was not going to deter me from my mission. I was going to find Nikolas, give him the happy news, and then go back to the party and celebrate my freedom.
After the freezing temperature outside, the main hall felt like a sauna, and I had to cling to the banister when I climbed the stairs to the second floor of the north wing. Only the most senior warriors lived in this wing so Nikolas had to be here somewhere. If he’s not with Celine, a niggling voice said, and I shook my head to banish the ugly thought.
Standing at the end of the second-floor hallway, I looked at the row of closed doors and realized the flaw in my plan. I had no idea which door was Nikolas’s and I couldn’t very well knock on all of them. “Damn it,” I muttered, wandering down the empty hallway. Now I was going to have to wait until tomorrow to talk to him, and I had a suspicion I would not feel as courageous in the morning.
“Sara?”
Startled, I whirled and stumbled into a hard body. Hands reached out to steady me, and I looked up into Nikolas’s curious eyes.
He released me and stepped back. “What are you doing here? Were you looking for me?”
Seeing him set off a maelstrom of emotions in me and sent my courage flying out the nearest window. “N-no.” I moved to go around him, but I was going too fast and I staggered sideways. He caught me and turned me to face him again.
“What is wrong with you? Are you drunk?”
“No,” I retorted, and I couldn’t help but remember the last time he had accused me of being intoxicated. This time he was probably right. As if on cue, the hallway started to spin, and I knew I needed to get out of there before I did something to humiliate myself. I pulled my arms out of his grasp, but the jerky movements were too much and my stomach began to roll. I clapped a hand over my mouth. “Oh, I don’t feel good,” I moaned through my fingers.
I heard him sigh before an arm went around my back and another slipped behind my knees to cradle me against his chest. Shock rippled through me, and I would have tried to get free if I wasn’t struggling not to throw up on both of us. He hurried to the last door and managed to open it without releasing me. I barely got a glimpse of a living room done in dark woods and muted greens and browns before we entered a large bathroom. He set my feet on the tiled floor, and I threw myself at the toilet where I began to retch violently.
“Oh God, I’m dying,” I sobbed between vomiting tequila and beer. I’d barely been ill a day in my life, and the few times I had been sick were nothing compared to how wretched I felt now.
It took a few minutes for me to realize Nikolas had been behind me the whole time, holding my hair out of my face. Humiliation added to my misery. “Please, go away and let me die in peace,” I whispered hoarsely before another bout of vomiting came on.
He let go of my hair and I thought he left the bathroom. Then I heard water running in the sink and he was back again, lifting my hair to lay a cool, wet cloth across the back of my neck. It felt so good that I couldn’t bring myself to ask him to leave again. I had no idea how long I hung over the toilet throwing up, but he stayed with me the entire time, quietly pressing wet cloths to my neck. When my stomach finally finished expelling every drop of vile liquor, I flushed the toilet and sagged against the blessedly cold porcelain tub, too exhausted to move. I heard the water running again before Nikolas lifted my chin to wash my face with the cloth.
“Do you need to throw up again?”
I shook my head weakly, too tired and embarrassed to look at him. I drew my knees up against my chest and rested my head on them. I wasn’t sure where I was going to get the energy to stand and walk back to my room, and all I wanted to do was curl up in a ball and go to sleep right there on his bathroom floor.
“Here.” I smelled the gunna paste before it touched my lips, and I raised a hand to push it away.
“Trust me; you’ll be glad for it tomorrow.”
It took only the suggestion of the whopping hangover I was going to have in the morning to make me open my mouth and take the horrid paste. I shuddered as I swallowed it. I thought I heard a soft chuckle, but I was too wrapped up in my misery to care.
“Okay, let’s get you off this floor.” Before I could say anything, he picked me up like I weighed nothing and carried me into the other room where he set me down on a soft leather couch. I huddled with my head on the armrest, and I felt the couch dip when he sat at the other end. For several minutes, neither of us spoke and I tried to come up with something to say to him.