Page 10 of Infernal

I quietly made my way downstairs and fixed myself a bowl of cereal. In the quiet of the empty kitchen, I leaned against the counter and took a spoonful of cereal, mulling over what Gabriel had said about the bloodbond. The more I thought about it, the more I realized he was right: Iwasgoing to need something to help me survive this connection without losing myself in it completely, and if dosing myself regularly was the way to do it, then I was all in.

Anything was better than the agonizing pain of these incessant withdrawals.

After forcing a few more bites down, I rinsed out my bowl and tiptoed back up the stairs. My heart and mind had every intention of going right back to my room, but I found myself standing outside Dominic’s bedroom door, utterly conflicted. There was a war going on inside of me, one that threatened to rip me in two. On one hand, my heart was screaming at me to go back to bed—to suffer through the pain no matter the cost to me. And then there was the other side. The part of me that made my feet refuse to move no matter how much I inwardly cursed at them.

Apparently, my body had a mind of its own, and it wasn’t willing to suffer the way my heart was.

Conceding the battle, I knocked on his door.

No answer.

I knocked again and waited an entire two seconds before opening the door myself.

Apparently, patience wasn’t one of my virtues.

“You do realize the point of knocking is to wait for someone to answer,” chided Dominic, his tone as flat as an out of tune piano. He was lying on his bed, bare-chested, with his feet crossed at his ankles and a book in his hands.

“Thanks for the etiquette lesson.” I shifted uncomfortably, still hovering by the door. “Can I come in?”

“Well, that depends,” he said as he placed the book down beside him and lifted off the bed. The taut muscles on his abdomen pulled and flexed as he sauntered across the dim-lit room to me.

“On what?” I asked, forcing my eyes to stay topside.

“On what you’re here for.”

I wasn’t entirely sure of that myself.

“I can’t sleep,” I admitted, my eyes accidently dipping down to his bare abdomen as he met me where I stood. I immediately regretted it as my cheeks flushed with heat. When I looked back up at him, he was smiling triumphantly.

“You like what you see?” he asked as he leaned his forearm against the doorframe as if to give me a better view.

I immediately bristled. “Cocky much?”

“You have no idea.” He smiled wolfishly, and the heat in my cheeks damn near scorched me.

This was a bad idea…

So very bad.

“I shouldn’t have come here.”

“Probably not,” he agreed.

Jackass.

I turned and tried to walk away, but he quickly caught my arm and hauled me back inside, shutting the door behind me and then locking it.

I’m in trouble. “Dom—”

He pressed his finger against my lips, silencing me.

For a moment, I was confused, thinking maybe he had heard someone coming down the hall, but when his hand slid away from my lips and caught my waist, I knew this had nothing to do with company and everything to do with us.

“Why don’t you tell me why you’re really here,” he said, looking at me like he already knew the answer. Like I was here to satisfy the bloodbond.

“I’m not here for that,” I said, though it tasted like a lie.

His gaze travelled down to my mouth and then my neck, eyeing both hungrily. “Then why are you here?”

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