Chapter 2
The girl stirs. Finally! I might’ve shot myself in the head from sheer boredom.
I couldn’t leave her in my house, and I couldn’t leave my house, so I contemplated both suicide and homicide.
The only thing that kept me from pulling the trigger while she slept was one thing: I don’t execute civilians for free.
My paranoid side questioned the civilian premise, while my crazy side wondered how I could take advantage of her misfortune.
Getting stuck with a hitman would definitely be considered a misfortune by many.
Yawning, the girl stretches, one slender hand falling over the couch, the other rubbing her eyes. She makes a massive effort to open them and check her wrist. Groaning—likely because there’s no watch on the wrist—she rolls and falls off the couch.
Yup, just thumps face-first on the carpet. Good thing my sister picked out a thick, fluffy carpet. Is this something women do? Just roll off the couch onto the floor? I wouldn’t know. I never spent a morning with a woman, and I definitely don’t sleep with my sister.
Tapping around her, she grabs her glasses and sticks them on her face, but doesn’t make an effort to get up. She pulls the blanket from the couch and sits on the carpet, looking around for a watch or whatever the fuck.
Pretty feline-green eyes behind black-framed glasses notice me, widen.
The girl screams, scrambles to get up, but the tight space between table and couch doesn’t allow for much movement.
When she figures that out, she crawls toward the window and looks back as if I’m gonna chase her.
I could’ve taken all her nine feline lives by now. Damn.
The girl stands, hands out, palms up. I’m not sure what this is. A “don’t approach me” gesture or some sort of kung fu stance.
“Mr. Homer?” she asks.
“Yes.” I smile. I’m genuinely happy she brought up Mr. Homer. I’m gonna have a fucking ball with this girl for the duration of her stay.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t hear you come in.” She eyes me suspiciously. “How long have you been sitting there?”
“I just came in.”
She smiles but wrings her hands, obviously uneasy. “I fell asleep.” She points. “On the couch.”
That’s okay, baby girl. I’m gonna get you up in the bed within twenty-four hours. Goals. I have them. In response, I nod. I mean, I don’t know what the fuck else to say. She seems chatty, so I let her chat. Women love it when men listen while they talk.
“Um, okay. You brought the spare key?”
“For whom?”
She sits, fixes her abundant hair, her glasses, the ring on her right thumb, and I note no other rings. Once done fidgeting, she folds her hands in her lap. “I don’t know for whom. That’s what you said you’d bring this morning.”
Ah. Mr. Homer intends to stop by this morning.
Good to know, but I can’t give him shit for renting my cabin in front of the guest. That would make me a very bad host, and I intend to be the best host ever.
A rental-with-multiple-orgasms kind of host. A one-she’s-not-gonna-forget-for-the-duration-of-her-civilian-life host.
“I made you coffee,” I say.
She smiles so wide, you’d think I offered her a rock on her finger. “Ooooo, gracias, Mr. Homer. Super.” She claps, then bends, looking around for something again.
“It’s ten in the morning, dear. What are you looking for?”
“My phone.”
I took that shit away. Didn’t go through it ’cause of passwords and all that crap, but I’ll get Sokol on it once I set up my laptop. The girl gets up and walks toward the kitchen.
I snatch her wrist.
She freezes, looks down at me with fear in her eyes, but says nothing and doesn’t tug her hand away. I swipe my thumb over the inside of her wrist. Soft, almost innocent. Nobody is innocent.
“Bring me a cup, would you?”
“Sure,” she whispers.
While she gets the coffee, I finally take off my jacket, yank the preppy white shirt from my pants, unbutton it, remove it.
That leaves me in a black long-sleeve turtleneck and worn black jeans I’d bought ten years ago for Nemanja’s funeral.
My on-the-job uniform doesn’t fit the cabin mood, but I should have some clothes upstairs.
Unless the Homers cleared out my closet.
The girl puts my coffee on the table, and I note she doesn’t put in creamer or ask if I want sugar. I drink it plain anyway, but still, maybe she’s judging my character already.
She sits back on the couch and sips her brew, eyes everywhere besides me. The boring shit on TV gets more attention from her than I do. Or maybe she’s at a loss for words now because she’s feeling a bit awkward.
That’s all right. We’d do small talk, yet important talk. People often skip the basics. I love the basics. Hi, how are you? Let’s fuck. “You here on vacation?”
“Kind of. I’m studying for my thesis.”
“Which is about?”
“Toxicology.”
Impressive. “I barely survived high school,” I lie.
She laughs. A cute little sound, not too much, but enough so that I know I eased the tension.
I’m a big guy, and I know the second she sees my tattoos, she’ll either wanna fuck me or bolt. There is really no other option. Women either love or hate guys like me. I love me, and I want her to fuck me, so I’ll do my best not to show the tattoos immediately.
I smile, and she blushes. Good girl. I liked the shyness of her.
Not so shy that I have to drag words out of her, but shy enough not to go around yapping about random shit to random people.
Family business is private business, and we pick our marriage material carefully. Not that I plan to marry her.
Although… I purse my lips. I could marry her. “How long do you plan to stay?”
“Three days. That’s what I booked.” She eyes me suspiciously since Mr. Homer should know this.
Never mind Homer. I have a single night to get her upstairs so I can fuck her for the duration of the next day.
She’ll work on my dick, not on her thesis, unless the study of my dick becomes her thesis.
Then we can call it mission accomplished on both sides and part ways.
“I’m gonna go hop into the shower, so…”
She’s telling me to leave. “You do that, Ms. Bentley.”
“Isla.”
“Isla,” I repeat. It rolls nicely off my tongue. I could flick her clit with my tongue while chanting lalalala real fast.
“Thank you for the coffee,” she says. “Please lock up when you leave,” she throws over her shoulder as she climbs the steps.
Yeah, she’s trying to get rid of me. Good fucking luck with that, girl. This is my house, and she’s stuck with me for three days.
“Okay,” I say, and snicker at the snow piling up on the driveway outside. If we get snowed in, nobody’s leaving this bitch for a week.
That’s what I love about this place. In winter, you can’t be a meteorologist, you gotta be a fucking weather seer to know when to get up here. Otherwise, nobody comes, nobody goes, and if the feds start searching for the killer, I have hours before they can get up here.