Page 28 of Reckoning

Madeline

When I woke up the next day, pillowed in downy blankets rather than the chafe of carpet threads, I thought for a moment I was dreaming. Some dream clung to me, not so much a memory but a sensation. A burning lust in my chest as Meyer lowered his face to mine, my fingers wrapped in his tie as I pulled him closer. The tiny heartbreak of his hand on my face.

The next moment, my hangover hit. I wondered at first if someone had jabbed an ice pick through my right eye. My hand raised to press against my forehead, and my knuckles brushed against cool skin.

I yelped or tried to, but it came out more like a wail. Someone laughed. I rolled my head to the side, squinting out of the eye that hurt less. Meyer was lying next to me, reclining with his hands behind his head as though he was on the damn beach. My eyes fell to the cut of his abs leading below his boxers.

I want to lick him there.

“Are you still drunk?”

I looked back at his face hurriedly. One of his eyebrows was raised at me. “What? No.”

“Are you sure?” He shifted to his side and drew one finger down my midline, between my breasts and across my stomach. “You’re looking at my cock and salivating.”

I sneered at him and shook off his hand, rolled over, and slid to the floor while trying to stay as horizontal as possible for the benefit of my head. When I was out of his sight, I quickly checked myself over. Fully dressed. Underwear still on. I breathed an audible sigh of relief. So I hadn’t completely lost my mind.

“You were very emphatic about not consenting.” He was leaning over the edge of the bed and looking at me. I covered both eyes and ground the heels of my hands into my eye sockets. Tearing out my eyes was seeming like a better and better idea.

“Did I have to define ‘consent’ for you, or did you look it up?”

“I asked my phone on the way home. It was very helpful.”

“Ha-ha.” I wanted to kill myself. Or I wanted him to kiss me again. Maybe he could kiss me, then I could kill myself.

No. If he kissed me, I wouldn’t be able to stop.

I was the worst fucking traitor.

I pulled myself upright, gripping the edge of the bed while the world spun. Meyer was lying down again, busy on his phone. He didn’t look at me as he spoke.

“You going to lose it?”

I dared to shake my head a millimeter in each direction. “No. I’ll be okay. I need water.”

“Go get some, then.”

I huffed, torn between wanting someone to take care of me and wanting to get as far away from him as possible. I stumbled to the bathroom and, after taking a long drink straight from the tap, set about the arduous task of removing the makeup that had settled into my pores overnight. No chance he thought I was beautiful this morning. My lipstick was smeared halfway across my face, and the mascara beneath my eyes made me look like a raccoon.

“No, a panda,” I muttered. “Endangered.”

“Pandas aren’t endangered anymore.” I almost screamed when Meyer appeared behind me in the mirror.

“How do you do that? You’re like a barn owl.”

We blinked at each other in the mirror for a second before he turned away. “I’m taking that as a compliment.”

“It’s not,” I snapped, turning around just as he dropped his boxers and stepped into the shower. Looking over his shoulder to catch me staring, he started the water with one hand and beckoned me to him with the other. I almost took a step toward him before I stopped myself.

Maybe I am still drunk.

*

When I was halfway through my breakfast, Meyer dropped my cell phone on the table in front of me. I hadn’t seen it since I was taken over a week ago.

“Call whoever you wanna call.”

I made no move to grab it, sensing a trap. He corrected himself.

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