Page 50 of Texting Mr. Stranger

It’s a fair point, even if he’s only saying it to twist the knife. Something like fear slithers into me. It’s deeper and spreads through me more fiercely than the type I feel in life-or-death situations. He’s right.

When I tell her, she might never want to see me again.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

BELLA

“She’s still in the bathtub,” Emily says, fiddling with the scrunchy on her wrist as she walks into the lavish living room. Sitting on the plush armchair, she puts her feet on the footrest. “She doesn’t seem happy.”

“At least she’s here,” I murmur. “At least she’s safe.”

“It doesn’t feel like a prison …” Emily looks down at the plush rugs covering the marble floor and then up at the chandelier, wordlessly appreciating all the grandeur we’ve suddenly found ourselves in. “I guess the only real way to test that would be to see if they’d let us leave.”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” I say softly. “You saw how wild and intense Matt looked.”

“Wild and intense,” Emily muses. “Those sound like the words of a lady in love.”

“Oh, stop,” I say, shaking my head. “In love. That’s the biggest load of craziest crap I’ve ever heard.”

“A journey of a thousand kisses begins with a single … kiss? Isn’t that the phrase?”

“I think you’re jumbling up your sayings.”

“Hmm, maybe.” After a pause, she says, “Was that his brother staring at the house earlier?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never met him.”

“Tall and lean, with a mop of dark hair?”

“Now, who sounds dreamy and in love, huh?”

Emily rolls her eyes. “You seriously think I’m a love-at-first-sight kind of gal? Men pick me up and fling me away. I do the same with them. That’s the way I like it.”

“Do you seriously think you’re kidding me with that talk?”

She rolls her eyes but says nothing else. We both know that Emily, if anything, is the more romantic out of the two of us. Because of the crap that happened to her when she was a kid, she just does a much, much better job at hiding it—maybe even from herself.

Suddenly, she stands. “I think somebody’s outside.”

Anxious energy prickles over my skin, making the hairs on my neck itch with tension. After that twisted man cornered me, my adrenaline has been stampeding relentlessly through me, a taunting, sick energy. A wave of relaxation moves through me when I see the shape moving toward the house in the semidarkness.

“It’s him—Matt.”

“I better make myself scarce.”

“You don’t have to?—”

But it’s too late. Emily leaves the room just as the old-fashioned-sounding doorbell rings through the house. I take a moment to study myself in the gold-framed mirror on the wall. It probably shouldn’t, but it feels weirdly important that I look presentable.

I’ve got my hair tied up. After a quick shower, I changed into a casual T-shirt. It does nothing to complement my build, unlike that video I texted him. Yet it doesn’t matter. This isn’t about romance or steam. I have to keep reminding myself of that.

When I answer the door, though, Matt’s expression tells me I’m wearing something else entirely. It’s almost like somebody has magically replaced my outfit. His eyes flit over my body, his hands curling into fists. After a pause, he looks at my face, not my body, but it seems to take an effort. “Can I come in?” he asks huskily.

“It’s your place,” I say, stepping aside.

“No,” he growls. “If you say go fuck yourself, I’m gone.”

“Come in …”

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