Page 113 of Psycho

I didn’t know how long we stayed there.

I counted to two hundred breaths before I finally felt brave enough to pull back and look at him.

He didn’t look like he was on the verge of losing control, but then again, I was sure he rarely ever lost control when he killed someone—or hurt them.

Slowly, he reached up and cupped my cheek.

I held still.

“Feeling better?”

I could only nod, my cheeks flaming. If this was how I reacted when I slapped him, I couldn’t imagine how I would be had I done something more dangerous.

“You don’t want to go to school today?”

I hesitated, thinking about it. God, I didn’t want to drop out, but sometimes I wondered what would have happened had I done just that.

I wouldn’t have to think about going to school right now.

I didn’t want to give up on school, but neither did I want to go today and face Jordy and her hordes of friends, nor did I want to see Josh, and I certainly didn’t want to be the topic of discussion between everyone else in the school.

I was just so tired.

I shook my head.

“Okay.”

He stood up with me in his arms and moved to the bed.

He lay down on the mattress and placed me on top of him, my chest to his chest. One hand between my shoulder blade, the other moving down between my legs, cupping me intimately.

I tensed, waiting for him to do something, to take it further, and let me lose myself to the delirium of his touches, but all he did was hold me in his arms.

His touch was like a branding inferno on my skin.

I swallowed and looked up, focusing my eyes on his neck, watching as it moved every once in a while.

It might be because I had woken up too early, or had gone to bed too late the night before, but my eyelids started getting heavy.

Slowly, they drifted shut, and then…

Nothing.

* * *

Tuesday morning,I woke up in the same position I had been in on Monday, with Micah’s arms wrapped tightly around me.

After I had fallen asleep in his arms the day before, I woke up about three hours later to an empty house.

I didn’t know how I felt about that, but I knew I didn’t want to act the same way I had.

I turned and took in his peaceful face set in sleep.

He didn’t look so calculating at that moment.

It didn’t look like an unfeeling man with his arms wrapped around me like that.

He almost looked… human.

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