Chapter 11 #2
His jacket material is soft in my hands, and it smells of him: cedar and leather, with a touch of wood smoke.
The urge to put it on, wrap it over my arms to keep the chill off, comes out of nowhere.
It makes me hesitate until thunder rolls through the house like a bad omen, snapping me out of it.
He really didn’t like it when I wore his sweater.
I shove my hand inside his pocket.
I’m not even sure what I’m looking for, until my fingers wrap around something cold and metal.
Closing my hand over it, I realize too late…it’s razor sharp.
Pain flares, intense and immediate.
I jerk my hand back, breath catching, seeing blood well fast, bright, and damning from thin cuts across my fingertips.
What the hell? Something cut me.
But I don’t have time to get upset. He could walk in at any moment. I glance around for something to stem the blood, but there’s nothing except a napkin that’s going to be too bulky. I wrap it around my hand anyway, hissing under my breath at the discomfort.
Then, with my other hand, I try the other pocket, this time, looking inside.
At first, I don’t see or feel anything, and my heart drops. All this risk can’t be for nothing.
But then his phone, sleek and razor-like, one of those folding models, is tucked inside the inner lining. Goosebumps prick all over as I slip it out. It’s surprisingly warm from being in his jacket, and very heavy. Is it made out of lead or something?
I wedge it down the front of my dress.
Just as the door to the kitchen opens.
It throws a monstrous shadow across the wall. I hide my napkin-wrapped hand behind my back and glance up in time to see Severin coming into the dining room.
He’s fully dressed in an expensive suit, his hair damp from the rain or a recent shower. He stops dead when he sees me hovering next to his chair.
“What are you doing?”
“ I-I was just…”
Severin strides over until he’s towering above me. “Just what?” His voice is molten fire, his emerald orbs turning me to ash where I stand.
At that moment, lightning floods the dining room in stark white, the storm choosing that moment to glare through the window. Each flash cuts across the planes of his cheekbones, his face shifting between man and monster as he glares at me.
“I was cold.” It’s the only thing I can think of. “And your jacket looked warm.”
He gives me an incredulous look. “You do seem to have a habit of stealing other people’s clothes.”
“I lost my suitcase.”
He stares at me for the longest time, eyes like shattered gems in the dark, and then his jaw clenches. “Then, I’ll get you a damn blanket. Go back to your seat.”
But the biggest dog I’ve ever seen, its muscles rippling beneath a dark coat, slinks in behind Severin. I stare at it, uncertain about moving.
Severin sees me looking. “Oh, Ben won’t bite.”
No, but you might.
A ghost of a feeling, of the first night when Severin’s warm mouth was on mine, suddenly makes my lips burn.
I force myself to walk calmly back to my chair, clutching my wrapped hand to my chest, and then sitting on it, concealing my injury as I slip into my seat. My heart is pounding like I’ve taken some illicit drug.
But Severin isn’t looking. He goes over to one of the trunks near the windows and takes out a thick herringbone blanket in a shade of forest-green.
It matches his eyes.
He brings it over to me. “Here.”
“Er, thank you.” But I can’t reach for it because I’m sitting on my hand. I didn’t think this through.
When I don’t take it, he sighs and slowly drapes the blanket around my shoulders. With how close he is, he’s able to see his phone in my cleavage if he so much as looks down.
“Warmer?”
I give a shaky nod.
“Must have caught a chill when you fell and ripped your dress the other day.”
I blink at his joke and the slight curve of his lips.
When I think he’s going to stalk away, he pulls the blanket toward him like a lasso, closer, leaning in. His cologne wraps me, adding another layer that locks me in tight.
With his breath warm, his tone low and dangerous, he adds, “Stay away from my damn wardrobe, Lovett.”
The way his eyes pin mine with unrelenting focus, the muted light tracing his cheekbones, and his hair, damp and unruly against the stained glass windows.
He looks like a fallen angel.
Beautiful and damned.
He was only a boy when he killed them.
I almost stop breathing, my heart hammering loudly in my chest.
Then he straightens up and stalks back to his chair. The huge dog lurks behind him, shadowing his swagger, until it settles at his feet like a tame lion.
When Kathy next comes in, Severin tells her to build a fire.
“A what?”
“A fire. Get one going, will you?”
“You want me to build a fire?” She looks like he’s sprouted a second head.
Severin glowers. “Isn’t that what I just said?”
“Right.”
Throughout breakfast, Kathy comes in and out, getting the fire going indeed, and then bringing even more food and a bowl of water for the dog. I sneak glances at Severin reading his paper and working his way through his stack of pancakes.
He doesn’t seem to notice his phone is missing.
At least not yet.
My pulse is still thundering in my veins, though. What was that with the blanket?
The blanket is still slung around my shoulders like a shawl, even though I’m sweating with stress and how warm it is in here with the fire now roaring. This is the most tense breakfast I’ve ever sat through. I haven’t even touched my plate.
I end up devouring the pancakes when it’s evident Severin isn’t watching my every move. And I manage to keep my napkin-covered hand below the table line, hiding it from sight.
But when I get to my feet to sidle out inconspicuously with Severin’s phone, Ben the dog stands up too and cocks his head, tail thumping against the wood floor as if to say, Where are we going?
Severin notices, his eyes narrowing. “Going somewhere?”
“Sorry, I was just—” My muscles lock, ready to bolt, and I gesture vaguely toward the door.
He continues to look at me, idly stroking behind his Ben’s ears. The animal sighs and lounges against him, tongue lolling.
“Sit.”
It isn’t a request.
I drop quickly back into my seat. Heat floods my face…and other places I’m trying so hard to ignore.
“I meant the dog.”
Indeed, the dog is now sitting.
I give a nervous smile and sink deeper into my chair.
What is wrong with me? The man I’m supposed to hate just made me blush with a single commanding word.
I should be disgusted by the way my body responds to him, not fighting the urge to obey every sharp-edged instruction that falls from his lips.
I force myself to focus on something else; anything.
..the blazing fire, the rain pattering against the windows, even the way the light catches the gold threads in the tapestry rug on the wall.
Anything but the way Severin’s fingers move with such gentle precision through his dog’s fur.
Stop.
This is exactly how men like him work. They make you forget who they really are with stolen moments of unexpected kindness. One minute, he’s threatening to throw me out a window, trapping me in chairs, and throwing me over his shoulder. The next, he’s wrapping me in blankets, building me fires.
I’m getting Stockholm syndrome.
That’s what this is.
Seeing him being soppy with a dog is messing with my heart. I’m a sucker for a wounded animal.
I really am.
Ben then proceeds to slobber all over Severin’s suit jacket sleeve. His frown deepens, making the scene comical at least from my point of view. I have to bite back a giggle. But it sticks in my throat. Then I have to drink some tea so the scalding liquid burns it all away.
The minutes seem to drag on for hours until, at last, breakfast is over.
Severin leaves without a word, but not before giving me a strange look. His dog trots after him.
And then I’m alone.
Fortunately, I find a first aid kit in the kitchen while Kathy is elsewhere in the house. There’s also a notebook by the phone in the kitchen.
My notebook now.
I grab it, dig out what I need from the first aid kit, and then I hurry to my room to lock myself in the bathroom. The cuts aren’t deep, but I’m wincing with every dab of salve. What on earth was that in his pocket?
A letter opener? A knife?
When I’ve secured a Band-Aid around each finger, I allow myself to breathe. But one glance in the mirror and I nearly freak out when I see there’s blood smudged on my cheek.
Oh God, is that why he was staring at me?
When I’m all patched up and I’ve cleaned up the blood, I remember Severin’s phone.
I remove it from my dress and try a few passcodes, such as 123456, but the screen remains stubbornly locked. I didn’t expect it to magically open. Annoyingly, it has a few bars of signal inside the house. If only I could use them.
I’m going to need Nola’s techie skills to get into this one.