Page 16 of Obsessive Stalker

My hair feels greasy and damp, my skin oily. I know I need a shower but I can’t bring myself to get into the stall and turn the water on. It feels too much like a trap. Last night I let my guard down in a way I shouldn’t have. And then again this morning I found myself silently begging for him to climb on top of me and take me.

I can’t do that again, I can’t let my lust for this man cloud my judgment and make me weak. Damien knows what he’s doing, knows that he has this effect on me, and he’s exploiting that.

Last night he handed me a ticket out of this mess, he put a lethal weapon in my hand, and even then, I backed down. Couldn’t bring myself to point a gun at him and pull the trigger for the second time.

Why not?

I take a rag and clean myself as well as I can without stepping into the shower, then put on the most understated clothes I can find in the closet - a pair of light wash blue jeans and a plain black shirt - and do my best to ignore the large section of lingerie.

Oh yes. Damien is definitely aware of how he affects me. He’s counting on it.

Feeling angry, I storm out of the bedroom and almost run face-first into a solid wall of muscle. Only, it’s not Damien.

“Miss Redding,” the man says. “I was just about to check on you. Mr. Barlowe is on his way back and wants you to join him for dinner.”

“Dinner?” I ask faintly. “Isn’t it early for that?”

The man glances at his watch.

“It’s half past five now,” he says. “Mr. Barlowe’s estimated time of arrival is six-fifteen. He’d like you to join him for dinner at six thirty.”

My mind feels cloudy, confused most of all by the fact that it’s already time for dinner. Without a clock in the bedroom, a watch, or my phone, I feel disoriented and disconnected from the outside world and from time itself.

That’s probably what he wants. Don’t kidnappers like to do that to their victims? It makes them more dependent, or something.

“Tell Mr. Barlowe to go fuck himself,” I say to the man.

And then, because I don’t actuallyfeelas brave as my words to the man make me seem, I rush back inside the bedroom and close the door, locking it. I hold my breath and wait for a moment, waiting for the guy to pound on the door, pick the lock, or even simply break it down.

But he doesn’t.

I search the room for the tenth time, looking for anything that could be useful when Damien gets here. There’s nothing, though. No nail clippers or scissors or tweezers in the bathroom, no shaving razors.

So I do something drastic, taking one of the ornate vanity mirrors off the wall in the bathroom. Covering it with a couple of thick bath towels to hopefully muffle the sound of shattered glass, I take a heavy boot from the closet’s selection of brand new shoes and swing it down hard, breaking the mirror into several large, narrow shards.

It’s a makeshift dagger. One that will cut its user just as much as its intended target. But cutting my hand open is a small price to pay for freedom.

According to my best guess, it’s been about half an hour since the guard told me of Damien’s impending arrival, which means I’ve got fifteen minutes until he’s here.

I spend the rest of the time cleaning up and preparing for him to come back. I take a quick shower, and then I change into one of the lingerie sets that he bought for me. It’s deep purple, mostly see-through mesh that leaves little to the imagination.

For some reason, the idea of Damien seeing me inthisfeels more vulnerable than him simply seeing me naked. Did he pick this out imagining me wearing it? And if he did, will I measure up to the picture he had in his head?

After unlocking the bedroom door, I straighten the sheets and blankets before climbing into the large, silky bed, hiding the dagger beneath my pillow before stretching out into a seductive pose.

Minutes later, I hear Damien climb the stairs. There are muted voices outside the door for a second, Damien and his guard dog exchanging updates, words that I can’t make out.

And then the door handle turns. I watch as Damien slowly walks in, his eyes looking over the room slowly before arriving at the bed, at me. His eyes take me in slowly, doing a once over and then another. Though I’m hardly wearing anything, I feel hot under his gaze now, my body awakening to him the way it always does even while my mind orders it to stay focused on the goal at hand, to not allow him to win this time.

“Kitten,” he says quietly, not moving from the spot in front of the door. “What did I tell you before I left? Do you remember?”

Frowning, I shake my head.

“I told you to be a good girl while I was gone. You have not been a good girl. Lex just updated me on your interaction with him. He also said that when he saw into the room earlier, it looked as though it had been ransacked. You’ve been snooping. Searching for something. What did you find?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I say to him, careful to keep my voice even but casual, to hide my lie. “I looked around, took a shower, tried on some of the clothes you got for me…that’s how I found this.”

I run a hand down my side, resting it on my hip. I want to cringe at the action, at the forced way I’m trying to play the role of seductress. None of it feels natural to me. How could it, when I’ve never actually seduced a man before?

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