Page 123 of Crave
Needed to get out of this bed, out of this feeling, out of the haunting weight of absence. I laid my legs over the edge of the mattress, my underwear lying discarded on the floor. I picked up my panties and slid them on before slowly rising and saw Silas’s t-shirt tossed over the back of his chair.
My legs trembled, each step growing bolder before I grabbed the garment and pulled it on, ignoring the way the soft cotton brushed over my tender nipples. Still it did little to ease the discomfort in knowing what had happened in this room, my face and my body said it all.
I didn’t need a mirror to know I was wrecked.
I could feel it.
And I wanted more.
The house was too quiet. The kind of quiet that wasn’t natural—one that settled into the walls, thick with something unspoken, unfinished.
I moved through the darkened hallway, my bare feet whispering against the hardwood. Every step felt heavier than the last, like the silence itself was pressing down on me.
I hadn’t meant to pay attention. To the way Silas had changed when the phone rang. To the way his body had gone still as he listened to whoever was on the other end. To the way his voice had dropped into something dark, something unreadable, something that made the air feel too thin. He had barely looked at me when he hung up. Barely breathed before grabbing his shirt from the floor, dragging it over his shoulders.
Stay in my bed.His command still echoed inside me, his voice final, demanding.
Like I was something that could be commanded, placed, owned.
Like I was something he wasn’t willing to leave unguarded. I told myself it didn’t mean anything. That I knew exactly what kind of man Silas was and me thinking I was anything more than a toy for him to use and discard was only going to destroy me in the end.
The air was cool, but my skin still burned, still thrummed with the remnants of what had been done to me.
The hunger was still there.
Low and simmering.
I should be sated and repulsed, all at the same time.
But I wasn’t.
I was desperate and thirsty.
I stepped into the kitchen, exhaling softly as I reached for a glass, filling it from the tap. The first sip did nothing. The second barely touched the fire still twisting inside me. I pressed the glass against my lips, closing my eyes, trying to will away thefeeling. But it didn’t work. Because I wasn’t just thirsty. I was starving.
For them.
For this thing they had created inside me, the thing that no longer belonged to me. My fingers tightened around the glass, my pulse thudding against my ribs. I should go back to bed—my bed. And pretend this ache will go away on its own.
I should?—
The prickle of awareness slid over my skin, slow and heavy, curling down my spine like smoke.
My breath caught.
I turned.
And there he was.
Jude.
He leaned against the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, watching me.
Waiting.
Something deep inside me twisted, sharp and hungry.
Because I knew.
