Chapter Eighteen

Teegan opened her eyes to the smell of fresh coffee and flowers, and the sight of a gorgeous man sitting in a chair next to the bed.

“Well, I don’t have to wonder where I am.”

“Didn’t want you to wake up to a door that wouldn’t open and an alarm that alerted me you were trying to leave.” His half-cocked smile was sexy and revealed a side of him she hadn’t seen until now. His expression changed and grew heated when her eyes met his. “I like the idea of keeping you here against your will. The thought of stripping you naked and handcuffing you with your legs spread wide appeals to me.”

Despite her best intentions otherwise, she squirmed at the image his words stirred in her mind and the heat that image created in her core. His expression grew even more arrogant as he continued to describe the scene. “Spending hours learning what pleases you. What feels good. How much pain opens you up to more pleasure. Teaching you to please me. Playing your body like an instrument. Making you beg me to let you come. I will do all of these things to you. You will do things with me that you’d never do with any other man, Teegan. I will break you down and reshape you into my dirty…little…girl.”

He rose to his feet and stepped toward the bed. “You’re breathing hard. You like the idea of me using you for my pleasure. My perfect, pretty little fuck toy.” His eyes had grown dilated, the pupils ringed by an almost translucent blue. A wave of shame and raw need washed over her at the thought of being used by a killer.

“Dirty. Little. Fuck. Toy,” he whispered. “I’m not your garden variety male, Teegan.” He grabbed her hand and rubbed it over the impressive erection that strained against his jeans.

She could only stare up at him in a daze, as if hypnotized by his delicious threats of using her body. “So you’re holding me hostage.”

“Not hostage, no. The term hostage implies that I will let you go if my demands are met. You will meet my demands, Teegan, but only because you’ll want to. And even then, I won’t let you go. You’ll find that I never exaggerate. If I tell you something, I mean it.”

She gazed hungrily at a piece of toast on the tray next to the bed. There was coffee, too, and an omelet. She grabbed the toast as if he might take it from her, the crunching sound loud in the silence of the spacious room. He poured her some coffee and she took a sip, wincing as the heat burned her tongue. But she persevered and took another sip as she braced to speak her next words. “I wouldn’t have regretted making love.”

“I don’t make love, Teegan; never have. You’re going to be fucked, and it’s going to be so good. You’ll want it, too. I’ll make sure of that.”

“You think I’m scared of you? I’m not, Thomas. I’m scared of myself, though.”

He leaned his head back and laughed. “Why on earth would you say that?”

“I’m scared that you and I are more alike than I could have ever imagined.”

There was that cocky grin again, but it was quickly replaced by a piercing gaze that promised sin, pain, and the determination to cut through her resistance. In that moment, she knew he would do just what he’d said. It was inevitable. Her thighs clenched with pleasure at the thought of being his dirty little fuck toy.

“We need to go get some of your things. I bought you things, but I want you to be comfortable with your own personal items. You’ll need your computer and your notebooks. I know how much you love to write. You should really write a book. You’re talented, Teegan. You’re meant for far more than you’ve been doing. You should share that talent with the world on your own terms.”

“My own terms? Really, Thomas?!”

“Oh, your writing will be on your terms. The fucking will be on mine. But it’s true; you’ve been doing blogs but you have so much more potential than that.”

The spell was broken. As easily as he had pulled her into his description of his future plans for her, he had dropped her back into the present. Something in her lamented their moment of dirty talk being over. What the fuck was he doing to her?

She hadn’t shared with him that she was already planning to write a book. The fact that she was using him as a research subject for that book probably wouldn’t sit well with him, so she planned to keep that tidbit of information to herself. “You seem to know so much about me. Is there anything you don’t know?” she asked, finishing off the toast and starting on the omelet. “This is amazing, by the way.”

She was trying to be indifferent to him, to hide the fact that she had every intention of using him as much as he would use her. He would give her real insight into a killer’s mind. But it wasn’t supposed to be like this. No connection. Just research. He was turning things around on her and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. She had underestimated him.

“I have an awesome chef. I’d love to have you here every morning for a gourmet breakfast.”

“Do I have a choice?”

“No,” he declared, his tone decisive. “But I thought it would be easier if you thought you did.”

“Easier on me? Or you?”

His eyes narrowed ominously. There was that calculating, arrogant look again, from the man who was set on keeping her under his watchful eye. The one set on making her his in every sense of the word. “Get dressed,” he commanded abruptly.

She jumped up a little too quickly, all too eager to escape his knowing gaze. She went to the bathroom, brushed her teeth, swept her hair into a messy topknot, and then ventured into the closet, pleasantly surprised to see he had bought clothes for her.

“I bought you all the things you like,” he said as he leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest. “It’s been fun getting inside your head, Teegan. After all, isn’t that what you’re trying to do to me?”

She cast a guilty glance to the floor as she bit her lip. Perhaps he knew she intended to use him as a case study and he’d been playing dumb all along. It scared her the way he seemed to know her thoughts. “How do you know what I like?”

“I told you, I’ve been watching you for some time now. I have a penchant for details, so my knowledge of your likes and dislikes is…thorough, I’m afraid. You see, you’ve underestimated me, Teegan. You should be very careful.” It was a warning that should have frightened her, but instead intrigued her enough to make her want to stay.

“I’ll take your word for it,” she said and turned away from him, doing her best to ignore the fact that he was watching as she threw on jeans and a t-shirt with athletic shoes. “You’re staring.”

“How can a woman be so beautiful with no makeup on and dressed so casually? Well, will you look at that… You’re blushing.”

She knew by her heated cheeks that it was true. There was nothing to be done about it, so she opted for a little levity, punching his arm lightly as she passed by on her way to the bedroom door. “Well,” she said lightly, “let’s go before you embarrass the crap out of me.”

He stared after her as he absently touched the place on his arm. For a moment he felt like a kid. She was bringing out a side of him he hadn’t experienced in years, and it was making him fall even more in love with her. He strode after her, shaking his head in disbelief. “You’re an extraordinary woman, Teegan.”

“Now I really am blushing.”

“You were blushing before.”

Impulsively, she stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek, then leaned back to study him. He was dressed in jeans and a button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to reveal chiseled forearms.

He grabbed her shoulders, immobilizing her. He couldn’t help how his thumbs began rubbing over her collar bones, learning her curves. Hell, even this modicum of control over her felt good. “Like what you see?” His sinful voice slid over her skin, tingling along her nerve endings all the way down to her toes.

She tilted her chin defiantly. “Yeah, I do. If I’m going to be abducted, I don’t want it to be by some ugly mug.”

He laughed, a full, throaty sound of pleasure. She made him feel young—happy, even. It was an unfamiliar feeling for a man whose life had required that he be serious all the time. She was truly a breath of fresh air that appealed to him in unexpected ways. Getting to know her was going to be even more invigorating that he’d thought. “Let’s go.” He grabbed her arm, pulling them out of the moment, which he had a way of doing unexpectedly.

“Okay, okay,” she muttered as she struggled to keep up with him. When they reached the black SUV, he held her door open for her. It looked more like something a hitman or FBI agent would drive: black tinted windows that could be seen out of but not into, along with the latest Bluetooth and GPS gadgetry. The dash lit up like a spaceship when he pressed the ignition button to start their journey.

“Are you sure you’re not some undercover agent for the FBI, Thomas?”

“Hell, no, I’m not a fed. But it’s got bulletproof glass, too.” His grinning statement only confirmed what she already knew: he wasn’t new to any of this.

“So, how did you get started doing this?”

“Doing what?”

“Killing.”

His gaze pinned her in place and she wondered if she’d gone too far. “You do understand that asking questions like that is just going to guarantee that you’re not going anywhere. It isn’t just me I have to protect”—

“It’s your family too. Your father, right?” She’d only been guessing up until now, but the look on his face told her all she needed to know. This was a family business of sorts. “Maybe you’re right, Thomas. Maybe ignorance is bliss.” The family that slays together stays together and blood is truly thicker than water. I’m an outsider.

“Let’s just say this… Not knowing details could save your life. I’d hate to have to kill you.” There was no humor in his solemn expression.

“You’d kill me?”

He pulled into her driveway and cut the engine, turning toward her to give her his full attention. He considered her through hooded lids and chose his words carefully. She needed to understand her circumstances.

“I’d do all I could to avoid it, but it would be easier all around if you’d just be smart and not push me. Don’t suddenly develop a conscience, okay? My family’s issues have nothing to do with you. Just focus on your writing.”

She knew it wasn’t a suggestion. He was giving her some sound advice, and if she had any sense at all she’d take it. She wanted a story, an inside look at what it took to make a killer. Nature or nurture? In this case, perhaps both. “You want me to write. I get that, but how do I do that without getting into your head?”

“Focus on Mummy Man. Make your story about him and not me. That way, you’ll write your book and stay alive. I’m going to say this one time: you’re dealing with more than one serial killer.” So he did know she had every intention of writing a book, and he seemed fully on board with her topic of choice.

So what was he saying, exactly? That his family was a band of vigilantes? Or that she was dealing with him and the Mummy Man? She’d pushed him enough for now. Her curiosity had gotten her in deeper than she’d originally expected. “I say, let’s focus on the task at hand.” She tore her attention away from him, took one look at her house, and jumped out of the car.

She was off and running toward the front door before he could stop her. “Thomas!” Her voice sounded panicked as he ran behind her up onto the porch. “Thomas,” she repeated as she covered her lips with trembling fingertips. “Someone’s been here. Look,” she urged, pointing toward the front door.

What the hell?

The front door was ajar. Thomas understood the criminal mind better than most and it was obvious to him that the intruder had deliberately left the door open to frighten her. And frighten her, it did. But he also knew that her fear would be blunted to some degree by the knowledge that, with Thomas by her side, she was no longer alone. She was reaching out to him as her protector. He was sickened by the fact that, if he hadn’t insisted she stay overnight, Teegan would have been here when the intruder broke in.

He reached around her waist, placing her behind him, and pulled a gun from the back of his jeans. “Wait here.” The look on his face left no room for argument. He moved through each room and only let her enter after he was certain it was safe.

Teegan was shocked at the state of her house. She always kept her home meticulously tidy. Pictures on the wall had been crashed to the floor, drawers were open with their contents strewn all over the room. Black spray paint shouted words of accusation like bitch and whore on the wall. She couldn’t think of anyone who would want to do this. She didn’t think she had any enemies, but this was clearly a personal attack on her and not just a random break-in.

“This was personal,” he said grimly, confirming what she was already thinking. “I know this is probably the last place you want to be now, but I need you to check and see if anything’s missing.”

“I don’t want to go upstairs alone.” This was a different kind of fear. The kind that wound its way around your throat and threatened to take your breath away without the aid of a forceful hand.

He grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her just enough to pull her out of her state of shock. “Hey. I’ll be right there with you. And I’m going to get the son of a bitch who did this.” She knew he meant it. It was enough to spur her into doing what he’d said.

She ran up the stairs and once again was shocked when she saw her mattress had been sliced and diced with a large butcher knife. The knife was stuck in a note on the wall with four words: Compliments of Mummy Man.

Her laptop was still there and next to it was a flower that had been formed out of the kind of gauze that Mummy Man used to wrap his victims. He had been stalking her and she never even knew it. But why?!

“He’s been watching you. Get what you need. We’re getting you the hell out of here.”

She hadn’t even heard Thomas come up behind her. She was relieved when she opened her closet to see that at least one part of the house was untouched. The thought of Mummy Man touching her personal things sickened her.

“I’ve never felt so violated. You don’t need to worry about killing him. I think I’ll do it myself.” She was furious that this man had been inside her house, touching her things and violating her even though she hadn’t been home. Her home was supposed to be her safe haven from the world. She didn’t feel so safe there anymore.

“That’s my girl,” Thomas chuckled. He knew this would motivate her. They were a team now, bound together by anger and a thirst for revenge. Together, they would make the bastard pay with blood.

She hurriedly packed a suitcase with clothes and started stuffing her overnight case with toiletries. “I’ve already bought you all of that,” he growled. “Let’s go!”

She swept her arm over her makeup counter and caught all the items in the overnight case, then zipped it shut. It gave her some sense of control over all this chaos. When she had finished, he grabbed her hand and they took off down the stairs to the car. They didn’t want to be there if the intruder decided to come back. They needed to regroup.

A plan was formulating in Thomas’ mind. They would find him on their own terms and then…they would kill him.