Page 80 of The Villain

I sank down onto the floor, banging my back against the handle of the cabinet. I bit into my lip hard enough to prevent a sound but not enough to stop my tears of pain. Of fear.

What if this was it?

What if, after all that—everything we’d been through—I never got the chance to tell Dare how I felt?

The patio door handle jiggled. I swore it did.Or was it the front?Because a second later, the front door opened.

“I’m back,” Dare called.

“Dare!” I cried out—choked out. I couldn’t even tell.

Heavy footsteps brought him to me in an instant, and the grocery bag landed with a thud beside me.

“Athena—Jesus.” Dare lifted me up and pulled me against him.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry?—”

“What is it? What happened?”

“I thought…” I inhaled a big breath. “I’m sorry. I thought I heard someone at the back door, and I panicked.”For no reason,because everyone who’d tried to kill me was dead.“I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong?—”

“Don’t,” he warned. “Stay here. I’m going to make sure everything is okay.”

I nodded, listening to the mixed sounds of footsteps and metal and the sliding door opening and then closing. For however long it took him, time had a sound. A pulse. It beat like a living drum until I heard the door again.

“Just me.”

My exhale whooshed from my lungs. “I’m sorry,” I murmured, shaking my head. “I don’t know what came over me. My mind got carried away.”

“Don’t apologize.” His low voice was close, and then his hand was on my shoulder.Fear brought the darkness back, but his touch felt like light trying to break in. “Hang on.”

“Why—oof.” I hardly processed what he said before strong hands lifted me by my waist and hoisted me onto the counter.

He paused, holding me there for extra seconds like there was something that rooted him in place.

“You’re safe,” he rumbled low, the warmth of his breath close enough to reach my cheeks. And then it was the warmth of his hands that I felt framing my face and the press of his forehead to my own. “I promise you’re safe.”

There was no room for fear when he held me like this—imprisoned between wanting to push me away and needing to pull me closer. But there was something…something nagging my mind like a loose string begging to be pulled. A string in which my mind tangled.

Memories from high school bombarded this moment in an attack I hadn’t expected. Memories of how Darius would hold my face. How he’d smile and promise me his love and then kiss me until up was down and down was up and we were kissing on clouds.

“What is it?” Dare rumbled, breaking me from my thoughts.

I reached for his wrists, anchoring myself to the present, and let out the last of the tension from my lungs, along with the memory trying to hold me in its net.

“I had my first kiss on this counter, like this.”

He shuddered, and I knew I’d lost him. “I’m going to make some food.” And then he pulled away.

My eyes drifted shut, letting the sounds he made paint a picture in my mind of his big frame moving through the small kitchen. I heard the ding and clatter of the toaster oven being set. The sound of plastic unwrapping. The steady in and out of his breaths.

“What are you making?”

“Grilled cheese.”

I shivered, feeling the urge to protest tie a knot in my chest. Grilled cheese was a gateway to more fond memories of my high school boyfriend, who’d make us grilled cheese on the nights when Mom worked her second job.

Why was I thinking about Darius so much?

---