Chapter Fifteen

Addie

I’m pressed facedown into the couch, and even as angry and betrayed as I feel, my body is a traitor. It’s reacting to him like it would like nothing more than for him to free himself and plunge deeply within me.

He told people about me!

People he trusted.

He said I was safe!

He wasn’t here to protect me.

“I’m not going to fight,” I say finally, and he hauls me to my feet.

He watches me closely as he picks up my gun and empties the clip. There’s caution in his every motion as he pops the one in the chamber out and pockets the rounds.

“Come on,” he says, motioning me to his room. He leaves the pistol on the TV stand and waits for me to go before marching toward our bedrooms.

I break off to go to mine, but he grabs my arm. “My room,” he growls, and my heart beats double time.

What exactly does he have in mind?

“You don’t trust me?” I ask, assuming he’s worried I’m going to bolt. Rightly worried. I don’t want to be here with someone who’s playing fast and loose with my secret. I stand a better chance on my own.

He says nothing, and I walk into his room.

Fine. He wants to keep me under his thumb, so be it. After all, he has to sleep sometime. And when he does, I’ll be gone.

“Bed,” he growls, and I finally see how tired he is. His knuckles are torn and bloodied. I remember Dakin making a passing comment about it.

“What happened to you?” I ask.

“Nothing.” He’s terse, but I’m worried about that torn skin. I go to leave the room, but he grabs my wrist.

Spinning to face him, I look him in the eyes. “I’m just going to get the first-aid kit from the bathroom.”

He studies me, and then his grip loosens.

I leave and retrieve the kit. With it in hand, I walk back into the bedroom.

He’s sitting on the bed, his shirt off. I gasp at the power in his frame. What I’d known was all muscle is much harder than I expected. Every muscle is well-defined, taut, and strong.

Trying to rein in the sudden burst of heat I feel in my core, I sit next to him and take his hand in mine to look at the bruised and bloody knuckles. Tatters of flesh cling to his bones, and the whole mess looks like he tried to stem the bleeding with Kleenex. Little bits of tissue pulp are keeping some of the bleeding down, but that’s a recipe for infection.

I turn and open the kit, taking out several antiseptic wipes and ripping them open. Wiping his knuckles clean, they begin to bleed a bit more freely as I wipe away the tissue gunk.

He stays silent as I tend to his hands. Once they’re neatly bandaged, I take the kit back into the bathroom without further resistance from him.

This feels… weird. My heart is slamming. My body is yearning for him, wanting to be closer to him. But I’m mad at him. He gave me up.

When I’m back in his room, I strip off my shirt, then my bra. Pulling the shirt back on, I sigh in relief at the lack of confines. I’ve slipped into wearing sports bras that squish me down and make my breasts look much smaller.

It’s nice to breathe easily again.

Stripping my pants off, I leave my panties in place. I can sleep in them. Picking my clothes up, I fold them neatly and place them on the bedside table and stand before his bed.

This is not the way I thought I’d wind up here. And of course, now that I don’t want to sleep with him, I’m going to have to. Life is a fucking joke.

He looks up at me, and I see his eyes assess my chest before his jaw starts working like he’s steeling every ounce of self-control he has. I glance down, aware my nipples are hard and my breasts are fuller than usual, swelling all thanks to the damn sports bra.

I climb into the bed and curl into the corner against the wall.

The whole bed shifts as he stretches out and turns out the light. In the darkness, I listen to his breathing, waiting for him to fall asleep. My heart is thundering almost painfully in my chest as if warning me this is stupid.

But it seems stupid to stay.

Cliff betrayed me. He told his buddies about me. And one of them is a damned cop. A cop that tried to cuff me to take me in.

Something else Cliff said is circling my mind. Did Arlo really tell the whole world I have rape fantasies? I’ve never even had sex! I’m a fucking virgin! How would he come to the conclusion I have that kind of sick fantasy?

Cliff said my life is in danger. Does he mean that the people who would listen to Arlo would kill me?

All the what-ifs and questions are like vicious sharks circling round and round my brain. And I don’t see an end to them in sight. If only there was a way to get a finger on the pulse of the people.

I mean, enough time has passed that people have to be moving on and forgetting this, right? In a world where people are only warriors on the other side of a screen and move from cause to cause in mere hours, it seems weird that people are still on this after so much time has passed.

And I decide that I know what to do. I’m going to get online and try to figure out if people are still being crazy about this, or if they’ve calmed the fuck down and Cliff is just being overprotective.

Maybe he just doesn’t want me to leave for his own reasons.