Page 82 of Hold Me Until Morning

“Unfortunately, I can’t say I have any hot dates on the books. Though maybe you’re about to get yourself one.” She grinned, and I shook my head, getting ready to tell her to drop the pushing since she’d tried to corner me twice during the day to get the dirty deets from last night, her words, not mine, when the doorbell went off again, twice in a row.

Huffing, Lolly arched a brow. “Someone’s impatient.”

A frown pulled tight between my eyes, that unease lifting, and I pushed to standing. “Watch Maddie for a second?”

“Won’t look away,” Lolly promised.

I entered through the back screen door and hurried across the house to the front. The exterior light had just flickered to life, illuminating the front porch, though I couldn’t see that anyone was standing on the other side of the screen.

Disquiet clamped around my chest, slowing my steps as I edged forward, my mind starting to whir.

It’s nothing, it’s nothing, I silently chanted. I had absolutely nothing to be afraid of.

Except it was fear that smacked me across the face when I took the last step up to the screen door and caught sight of the man who lingered just off to the side, facing away with his hands planted on his waist.

Fear that drummed my heart and thinned the air, the oxygen becoming so thick I inhaled it like an oil slick.

Pruitt was here. Standing on my front porch.

Sickness curled in my stomach and bile climbed up my throat.

But he didn’t get to control me any longer. He had no bearing on my happiness. On my joy. On my daughter’s safety.

I refused to be afraid of him, which was kind of comical since I was terrified.

But I wouldn’t let him see it. Wouldn’t let him wield his manipulation.

So, I flicked the lock and lifted my chin as I stepped out into the descending night and prayed to God my knees would hold.

Darkness rained down and the air felt cold, as if it’d dropped by fifty degrees.

“What do you think you’re doing here?” I gritted my teeth to keep the words from shaking.

Pruitt shifted around, and a shockwave of that cold gusted. A squall that battered against my body.

Pruitt was tall and lean, and I’d once thought he had to be one of the most attractive men I’d ever seen. Brown hair and green eyes. Clean cut and high bred. I’d just failed to notice the wickedness that soaked him through.

Bitterness filled his voice. “I thought I should pay a visit to my wife.”

“I’m not your wife.” I spat it.

He laughed a condescending sound. “You promised your life to me. Don’t you remember?”

“And you turned out to be a man I didn’t know.” I wouldn’t back down or cower. Wouldn’t pretend.

I just tossed the truth out between us, the words toppling to the wood planks like jagged, pitted stones.

There was no missing the threat that was etched into them.

“You think you know me, do you?” His head cocked to the side.

His own warning.

Ice slicked down my spine, and I forced myself to remain upright, to keep from slumping in the fear that wanted to overtake. The vision of the depravity I knew he was capable of flashed through my mind.

My hands clenched and unclenched at my sides. “I know exactly who you are, and the rest of the world is going to, too, if you don’t get off my property.”

Cruelty spilled out with his laughter, and he was across the porch before I could prepare myself, no defense before he had my back plastered to the wall and his hands planted on either side of my head.

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