Page 97 of Monster

I wasn’t that stupid.

The front door clicked open, and I froze on the spot in the hallway.

I didn’t know why my heart was pounding so hard in my chest, why it felt like something akin to relief that he was home.

I shouldn’t want him here.

I should want him to stay as far away from me as possible, yet I was—

I was lonely.

And it was all his fucking fault.

I dreaded the silence this house took on the moment Lucy left for her house and before Dominic got home.

I wasn’t someone who craved or needed company, but with him, I was beginning to hate the solitude.

“Where the hell have you been?” I asked once the front door closed behind him.

He paused at the threshold and looked at me, frowning. “Excuse me?”

I should probably heed the warning in his voice. I didn’t.

“It’s late.”

“Not really.”

“It is late when you’re fucking trapped!” I screamed.

He narrowed his eyes at me before he took slow, steady steps toward me.

I backed away a little, but I didn’t want to show him I was intimidated, even if I was.

I stopped when I came to the kitchen. The small of my back pressed against the dull edge of the kitchen island, the same island on which he had laid me down like a fucking buffet and ate me out until I screamed my release.

I glanced back at it, heat moving through my body from the memory, before I turned back to him.

He was about half a foot away from me now, the heat of him coming out in waves and causing a slight shiver to overtake my body.

He cupped my cheeks with both large hands, and I could only look up at him.

“Okay?”

I shrugged off his touch, glaring at him. “No, I’m not okay.”

His calm demeanor was fucking me up a little more than it would have had he exploded and showed me all his ugly sides.

“What’s going on with the investigation? When can I leave?”

His eyes flashed with some unnamed emotion. Something I didn’t like very much. I almost wanted to take the words back, but no. I had the right to know, didn’t I?

I had the right to know when I would be getting out of here.

He took a step forward, closing the small six inches of space between us, and I leaned back, trying to put as much distance between us as possible. That only worked to make the lower halves of our bodies press against each other in the worst way possible.

“Dominic. Give me space.”

I tried to sound commanding.

---