It's a party, you're a couple drinks in, and you have a girl on your lap.

Cate knows that the ugly feeling bubbling up inside her is completely unwarranted. You're not dating each other. Hell, she's the one with the boyfriend—who is currently the life of the party, doing a keg stand around a circle of cheering onlookers. She's not a part of them.

Instead, her gaze is laser-focused on you. Sitting lax on the sofa, all up on some nameless bitch that doesn't deserve even a drop of your attention, let alone your hands under her—

Something inside Cate snaps, and before she even knows it, she's striding over with her heart ramming hard in her chest and blood rushing in between her ears. Her hand finds your shoulder, hand warm and firm and—when did she take her gloves off?

Her voice in your ear. Seething in that innocuous little whisper. "Get the fuck up and follow," and like a marionette on strings, you do. The comforting, warped compulsion to obey washes over your head and sends you shoving the girl off your lap and staggering to a stand. Cate doesn't even have to drag you to have you follow her obediently up the stairs and into an empty bedroom. The door locks behind her.

It's only the minutes after she tells you to "Sit." and you take your place at the end of the bed like a goddamn lapdog, that everything of the last few minutes processes. It's like waking up from a dream.