SWNOVELS Twilight Sins: Chapter 14
Trust your gut. Listen to your heart. Follow your intuition.
People spout abstract nonsense like that as if it solves everything. If it does for them, then whoop-dee-freaking-doo. What about people like me?
I’m supposed to trust my gut? The same gut that said it was fine that Benjy would leave every time we got in a fight and then be gone for days? He definitely isn’t cheating on you, my gut used to say. He loves you.
Don’t even get me started on my heart. I listened to that son of a bitch every time Benjy got mad and screamed things he would later swear he didn’t mean. Things like “you’re a worthless piece of ass” and “you’re the reason I drink.” When he told me I was like an anchor dragging him down, my heart told me that was the price of love.
Because I thought I loved him. Despite all of that, I thought I was in love with Benjy until the very end.
Which is exactly why I’m sitting across the kitchen island from Yakov, watching him make scrambled eggs and toast, with no idea what to make of the man in front of me.
I think he’s telling me the truth about whatever danger is lurking out there waiting for me, but I can’t be sure. He could also just be some garden-variety sociopath who locks women up for fun. His house is big enough for it. There could be women chained up in rooms all over this place and we’d never cross paths.
He cracks an egg with one hand like a professional and suddenly, my lady bits want to chime in and give the rest of my confused body some direction.
“Is there another room you want me to sleep in?” I ask, trying to distract myself.
“No.”
“But it’s your room I’m in, right? It’s where all your clothes are.”
I already know the answer because I had a front row seat to him taking off his shirt yesterday afternoon. The night he brought me back to the house, it was dark and there was a lot going on. I didn’t get a good look at him.
But it wasn’t dark yesterday. I saw every dip, ridge, and valley of Yakov’s midsection in full, unfiltered sunlight. And oh, mercy. What a midsection it was.
“Your skills of deduction are impressive,” he drawls.
Every perfect set of abs has to have one flaw. This one’s is that it’s attached to an asshole.
An asshole who is making me breakfast right now.
An asshole who went to my apartment last night and got me clean clothes and saved my cat from starvation.
A complicated asshole. The worst kind of asshole.
“I’m just saying that I can move into another room if you want me to. I don’t have to stay there if—”
“If you’re in my way, I’ll make sure you aren’t. Until then, eat.” He slides a plate towards me.
The eggs are impossibly fluffy and I didn’t know it was possible to make toast without burning it, because Lord knows I’ve never managed it. I’m hungry, so I take a few bites before I pick up the conversation he wishes I’d drop.
“It’s hard for me to be in your way when you don’t even sleep in there.”
Based on the dark circles under his eyes, I don’t think he slept anywhere.
He plants his palms on the marble countertop and leans forward. “Did you miss me last night, Luna?”
It should be illegal for it to feel that good when he says my name. Like he’s stroking a finger down the column of my neck.
My body heats and I practically bury my face in my plate. “I’m just trying to hold up my end of our deal. You went to my apartment and brought me some of my things, so I want to be a good captive. A model prisoner, if you will.”
“If you’re hoping for early release, keep dreaming.”
A million questions I know he won’t answer bloom and die in my head. He won’t tell me what the threat is, which means he won’t tell me how he plans to end it, which means he won’t tell me how long it’s going to take.
He can’t—or won’t—tell me anything about his life.
Maybe he’ll tell me something about mine.
“I need my phone back.”
He shakes his head in disgust. “And here I thought bringing you the cat would buy me at least one morning with no stupid requests.”
“It’s not stupid. I need to call my boss.”
“And tell him what?” Yakov asks.
“That I’m alive!” I snap back. “That I’d like to keep my job, but I have to handle an emergency and can’t come into the office for a few days.”
Yakov’s jaw tightens and panic flashes through me. I assumed all of his talk about me being here indefinitely was overkill. It’s hard to imagine a problem that Yakov couldn’t deal with within a week.
“This is going to be over in a few days, isn’t it?” I ask pitifully.
He drops the skillet into the sink and wipes down the counter. “I’m taking care of it.”
“Taking care of what? The threat or my boss?”
“Both,” he growls. “I’m taking care of everything, Luna. Just be quiet for five fucking minutes and let me do that.”
I shove my plate away like a brat, sending a piece of toast flying to the floor. “I’m sorry I’m not relaxed enough for you. Having my entire life turned on its head is a little stressful, as it turns out. I don’t even know if I’m going to have a job when I get back to my life. You might not relate, but I’d rather not be homeless.”
Without missing a beat, Yakov tosses another slice of toast onto my plate to replace the one I jettisoned. “I just told you I’m taking care of it.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you aren’t going to be homeless.”
I arch a brow. “Are you planning to pay my rent, then?”
He stares at me, his full mouth stubbornly closed.
“Wow. You really aren’t going to tell me anything, are you?”
His silence is enough of an answer.
“This isn’t normal,” I say, circling a finger in front of his face. “Normal people talk more than this. They talk a lot more than this. Take my best friend, for instance. Kayla. She talks nonstop. And since she hasn’t heard from me for two days after our date, I’d be surprised if she isn’t on her way to talk to the police right now.”
“I don’t give a fuck what she tells the police.”
“Maybe not. But your life would be a lot easier if the police didn’t come sniffing around. Right?”
His green eyes are the color of leaves after spring rain… and completely unreadable.
Then, without warning, he yanks my phone out of his back pocket and slides it across the counter to me. “You have five minutes. And I’m listening in on every fucking word.”