Page 63 of The Billionaire's Beauty

The setting? A horror movie version of the west wing of our house in the Hamptons. More like a cavern that a home, ominously dark, with only enough light to generate shadows and obstacles out of the looming furniture. I fumble along with my arms outstretched, looking for my mother. Even in the dream, I’m ashamed of my terror. A little kid searching in the dark for his mommy. You’re kidding, right? That’s the best you can do? You can’t even generate a bogeyman?

But the dream is plenty scary enough without the bogeyman, thanks. It’s not just the lack of my mother that does it to me. It’s the lack of anyone.

I hit a wall. Ricochet off in another direction. Stumble into something, generating a stabbing pain that starts in my knee and shoots out the top of my head. I stifle my cry of pain because it seems important to keep quiet and not wake anything that might be lurking in the darkness. I limp around, wondering why I can’t find any familiar landmarks, and hit another wall.

Out in the darkness, something rumbles. An animal. A demon. A monster. Whatever it is, I never want to find out.

That’s why all hell breaks loose in my terrified little kid mind.

“Where is everybody?” I shout, breaking into as much of a run as I dare in the gloom. “You can’t just leave me like this!”

Something moves beside me, heightening my panic.

A distant voice speaks. “Griffin?”

“Why would you leave me like this? Why would you— Wait. Is someone there? Hello?”

“Griffin? Wake up.”

Something grips my arm. I yelp with surprise and jolt myself awake, my entire body spasming.

“Griffin. It’s okay.”

The nightmare quickly dissipates, leaving me with an erratic heartbeat and a scream choked off in my throat. So that makes things fun. As does the fact that I’m drenched in a cold sweat and still shaky. It’ll be hard to act like a competent professional now that I’ve been reduced to my worst childhood fears in front of Bellamy. Who, by the way, is currently watching me with the kind of open concern that sets my teeth on edge. Given the choice between being a beast and a basket case, I’ll choose the asshole option every day and twice on Sundays.

She leans closer and massages my back, the silky curtain of her hair tickling my arm.

“What happened?”

“That should be obvious,” I say as I rub my hands over my face, pulling away because I don’t want pity. Not from Bellamy. “I had a nightmare.”

“I’d pieced that much together,” she says acidly. “Do you want to talk about it?”

I drop my hands and gape at her. “Do I want to talk about it? Have we met?”

She tenses. If I squint right, I can almost see the reins of her control slipping through her fingers.

“How about a simple no?” she says.

“How about you just stop asking. Any question that centers around me talking about something is going to have no as the answer. No. We don’t need to deconstruct my nightmare about being trapped in the west wing. Let it go.”

I get up, reach for the robe I keep at the end of the bed, slide it on and wonder how bad I’d have to act to get an explosion out of her. And then I wonder why I need this explosion so badly.

“There’s a saying. Monsters live in the dark.”

“Come on, Bellamy.”

“Maybe it’s past time for you to start shining some light on your monsters,” she says.

I don’t know why I feel so dangerously unhinged. Or why she’s so determined to highlight all my weaknesses, as though she doesn’t see them on full display already. Whatever it is, I can’t fight the urge to rub her face in it. Make her open her eyes and see.

“Maybe I’m the monster, Bellamy. Maybe that’s why you call me the Beast. Ever think of that?”

“Yeah, I’ve thought about it,” she says, making me wince with both her words and the directness of her gaze. “But I don’t think you are. I think it’s a defense mechanism.”

That hits way too close to home.

“Jesus Christ. Now you’re a shrink?”

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