Incipient A Dark Paranormal Romance - Bianca Scardoni Page 0,13
then brought his index finger up to his own mouth in a shushing gesture. My heart pounded wildly against my chest as I watched him through the mirror. I had only seen him once since that fateful night outside of All Saints when he shattered my entire world, and while I was terrified of what he was doing here, what he had planned for me tonight, a part of me—the sick, bonded part of me—was also contented to see him again. To feel his body close to mine, no matter how cruel and unforgiving his hold on me was.
I’ve missed you, angel, he said to my mind, his free hand back around the front of my stomach. Have you missed me?
Words could not describe how very much I had longed to hear those words from him again, but I knew they were not birthed from any real sentiment. I could see it in the callous way his mouth was hiked up at the corner and the way his vacant eyes mocked me through the mirror.
He was playing a game with me and I had no idea what the rules were.
My instincts were to tell him no. To tell him I hated him. Hated what he had become. To break out of his hold and turn the tables on him, something I knew I could easily do. But Gabriel’s words replayed in my head like a solemn whispered prayer, stopping me from doing anything brash.
I had to stay cool, calm and collected and play this thing smart if I had any hope of ever getting the real Dominic back. Even as he traced cold circles against my abdomen with his finger. Even as he pushed his palm against my mouth far harder than he needed to. Even as my grief enveloped me like a second skin.
Despite all of that and against every instinct in my aching body, I nodded my head.
Because I had missed him.
And because I was going to break the son of a bitch if it was the last thing I ever did.
Dominic stilled, his gaze fixed on me through the mirror, as though trying to decipher some riddle written in the hollows of my eyes. Neither one of us moved an inch as a whistling noise made its way into the room with us, the curtains from the open bathroom window whipping tirelessly against the wall.
The chilled air felt nice against my skin, sobering me as I stood there in the bathroom with the only man on earth I feared now. A dangerous truth I would never let him know.
As if sensing my game, he upped the stakes on me. What did you miss, angel? Hm? Was it this? he asked through my mind and then moved his hand from my stomach to the band of my pants, playing with the hem briefly before slipping his hand inside.
My eyes rolled back as he touched me the way only he knew how.
Did you miss that? he asked, needing the confirmation to fan his flames.
I nodded that I had, because it was the truth and because it was what I needed to do to break down the icy walls of his heart. I couldn’t stain our interactions with fear and allow him to thrive off the game of cat and mouse because he would always be the cat in that equation, and I would always be his prey—and that would only continue to feed the demon inside of him.
What else did you miss? he asked and then clicked out his fangs. Did you miss these?
Mutinous butterflies waltzed through my stomach and again, I nodded.
“Hm.” He moaned quietly against my ear as he removed his hand from my mouth and used it to push my hair over my shoulder. My skin prickled from his touch and I hated my body for betraying me so definitively.
With his hand firmly gripping my jaw, he titled my head and positioned my neck at just the right angle before bringing his mouth to my neck; his lips brushing eagerly against my skin.
A part of me, the dark and depraved part of me, wanted so badly for him to sink his teeth into my skin and take all this pain away, but there was another very real and loud part of me that wanted to punch him right in the gonads for putting me in this horrible situation in the first place. I just wasn’t sure which part was going to win yet.