Page 37 of This Time I'm Keeping You
She could literally feel the color draining out of her cheeks.All she could manage was a gasp.
“Tell me everything you remember about what happened between you and him.”
“He… ah.”She felt lightheaded just thinking about Malcolm Davy in her house.
“Poppy”—he took her hand in his—“you’re safe here with me.No one is hurting you again.But I need you to talk to me.”
“I told you I dated him, and that he became weird and stalkerish.”
“Got that.Tell me what else you remember, because Billy was about to get in his car and come here, but I said I’d fill him in after questioning you.So talk, Poppy.”
“I’m sure it’s all on record.”
“I want to hear your version.”
She nodded.“We met after I published my first book.I was never sure how he found me, but he turned up one day when I was in a coffee shop working, and we started talking.He told me he’d read my book and loved it.”
Nick released her hand and nudged her water closer.She picked it up and sipped.Poppy hated reliving anything regarding Malcolm Davy.
“He’d seemed normal and really nice to begin with.I thought….”She shot him a look.“Well, I thought he could be the one, and then suddenly everything changed.”
“Changed how?”
“He would turn up at my house at weird hours and bang on my door or ring me in the middle of the night, and if I didn’t answer, he’d fly into a rage.It got to where I thought, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’So, I went to his house to tell him I was done, and it was over.”
“You went to his house when you knew he was crazy?”Nick’s voice rose.
“I didn’t think he was crazy, just obsessive.”Poppy embraced the anger because it eased the numbing cold.
“Sound like one and the same to me,” Nick said.
“If you want to hear this story, then shut up and let me tell it.Stop judging me!”
He nodded, dark eyes angry.
“Besides, Malcolm had my favorite jacket at his house.I wanted it back.”Nick simply folded his arms, his lips forming a line, which she hoped meant he’d keep them shut.
“He opened the door with a smile.I said I was there for my jacket, and I wouldn’t be coming back, and that we were done.He said to not be that way.That he was having a rough time of things lately, but he was better now.It was weird, like all the crazy inside him had gone suddenly.We stood in the doorway chatting about my next book for a while.”
“You do realize that someone can’t flick a fucking switch and change just like that.”He snapped his fingers in her face.
“I’m not a complete idiot.There was no way I was going inside, and I thought if maybe we parted as friends, then he would leave me alone.”To his credit, Nick didn’t scoff.
“One minute, we were talking, and then in the next, he’d pulled me into his apartment.”Poppy clenched her eyes shut at the memory.
“What did he do to you, Poppy?”
“He tried to strangle me.”
Chapter15
“He did what?Jesus, fuck, Poppy.You should have told us this earlier!”The thought of anyone hurting this woman sent rage through him.
“Malcolm Davy tried to strangle me,” Poppy said.“I got free and escaped.He followed, but I was quicker and reached my car.”He read the fear in her eyes she’d felt that night, and he wanted to find Davy and kill him.
“So you drove from him straight to the police station, right?”She gave him a look that suggested he wasn’t the smartest person she’d ever met.
“Of course I did.They took my statement and said they’d follow it up.”
