Page 228 of Poison Aches

Bile, fast and hot, rises up my throat.

I clamp my hand over my mouth and rush for one of the three doors I spotted, my feet skidding on the floor, but upon trying the first door, I enter the en-suite bathroom.

Spotting the toilet, I make a mad dash for it, open the lid, and then I’m throwing up my entire gut out.

Each time I think I’m done, the image of Jackson’s wide-open eyes flash before my own and I retch again. It’s so bad that I retch until I’m dry heaving over the toilet.

I can feel myself getting feverish.

I don’t know if this is the result of the fear, what I just saw, or the drug’s aftereffects wearing off but suddenly, I’m so exhausted.

The heaviness in my body returns and I feel every inch of my body heating up.

He has a dead body—the one he brutalized, mutilated, and bludgeoned—in his bedroom.

And the sick thing is, the red he was using to paint when I woke up—that was Jackson’s blood.

He was using blood to paint!

I dry heave all over again, until my throat feels dry and itchy, as if I need a scraper to get everything out.

Feeling out of sorts, I blindly flush the toilet, then I just sit there, feeling disoriented and unable to move.

What the hell was that?

Crouching down, I slowly sink down until I’m lying on the cold tiles, pressing my forehead against them to try and cool down.

I realize then that I’m still trembling, and my feet are still covered in Jackson's blood, and there’s someone standing in the doorway of the bathroom, with his huge arms folded, his towering figure looming large as he watches me.

“Why?” I croak, peering up at Emmett.

He doesn’t say anything, just watches me. His stare penetrating but mostly unpredictable. I don’t know what he’s going to do.

The calm way he talked to me from the moment I woke up, walking me through the events of last night in a soothing, almost gentle manner.

Then he came for me, touched my face, traced his thumb along the seam of my lips, peered down at me with an unreadable look in his eyes, disarming and arousing me with his lethal nearness—all the while he had a major bomb waiting for me.

This man… he’s nothing at all like I thought he was.

Is Emmett a psychopath?

“Are you going to kill me?” I croak because at this point, there’s no point delaying the inevitable.

I hear a sound from him, then in my peripheral vision, I see him come into the bathroom.

Noticing him walk towards me, in that measured, perfect stride, my hackles rise and I feel it again.

My fight-flight instinct.

But it’s useless.

If I fight, I’ll lose.

If I try to flee, he’ll revel in catching me and then making me pay.

In a few strides, Emmett is looming over me, looking down at me like I’m literal filth on his gleaming tiles.

He crouches down, his cold gaze on me.

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