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Her mouth was so close to mine. So close. It was then I realized I’d never tasted her. I didn’t know how her lips felt against mine. Better rectify that right now.
I took hold of her jaw, fingers digging into her skin harder than what was comfortable. I turned her face toward mine and brought my lips to hers, kissing her fast and hard, swallowing up any response she might’ve given me—though I doubted she would admit to belonging to me just yet.
It took her a few moments to kiss me back, and even then, I could tell she was fighting herself, trying to stop herself from melting into me.
Her willpower was strong. She’d still deny me, even after tonight. She suspected I was a monster, that I’d hurt the cook… but she had no idea the depths of my depravity, how dark and dangerous I could be.
She better not try to involve anyone else in this, otherwise we’d have a problem.
Chapter Twelve – Brianna
What was wrong with me? No, seriously. That wasn’t a rhetorical question. What the actual fuck was wrong with me? That question echoed in my head all day Saturday, and no matter what I did, I couldn’t shake it off.
After Gareth had finished his… whatever the fuck you wanted to call it last night, he’d told me not to wash my sheets in the morning, that he wanted them for himself, for whatever fucking reason. When I’d gotten up, I’d found there was a bit of a mess. A little bit of blood, but not too much, along with some dried cum.
Fuck. Even now, I couldn’t believe he’d come into my room and done that. I couldn’t believe I didn’t fight harder to stop him. And, what was worst of all, I couldn’t believe I’d enjoyed it.
So, back to the original question: what the hell was wrong with me? I knew you couldn’t base anything on the way bodies felt, that sometimes your body could betray you and it wasn’t your fault at all… but saying that made it feel like last night with Gareth felt good. Just good.
That would be a lie, though, because it had felt fucking amazing. Like, it’d been impossible for me to think straight. My body had its own mind when it came to Gareth and his craziness.
Oh, it was insane. I was insane for feeling like that. I was even more insane for getting off at the things Gareth was saying, so I guess he was right. I’d known my whole life that I was different from everyone else, but I’d never thought I wasthatdifferent.
There would’ve been a certain poetic justice in what he’d said last night. You had to admit it. Killing him while he was forcing himself on me and retaking ownership of the situation afterward.
Oh, God. Listen to me. Gareth got in my head, and now my thoughts were all fucked up, even more so than they were before.
The housekeeper came at noon to do laundry and clean the house. Gareth had already taken my sheets for himself, though I had no clue why the hell he wanted them. For the blood? For the memories? I didn’t know, but I tried not to think about it. The housekeeper put new sheets on my bed while I worked on homework at my desk, fearing she’d say something.
It wasn’t like she’d seen the sheets before Gareth took them, so there was no way she could’ve known what had transpired on my bed last night. Still, my paranoia wouldn’t let it go.
I tried to focus on my homework, but I couldn’t. It’s why the damn chapter took me almost all day to do. I couldn’t get yesterday out of my head—not just last night with Gareth in my bed, but also the whole thing with Emily, the chef.
The bleach. The red dot on the lower cabinet. The broken, bleach-covered garbage can in the bin in the garage. The paper towels covered in blood.
Add onto all that the things Gareth had told me when I’d asked him. He hadn’t admitted it, but he didn’t deny it, either. All the less-insane, non-murder involving possibilities became less and less likely the more I thought about it. Again, my paranoia was playing a role, but I couldn’t deny the way Gareth made me feel.
Something was off about him, something very wrong. He wasn’t just a bully. He was a psychopath, and a true psychopath didn’t care about wrongfully ending someone’s life. He’d been pissed at me for being with Erin, so he’d killed the chef.
But where was her body?
My mind thought about the pool house and Gareth’s artwork. Each and every canvas I’d seen in there was full of red, a certain type of red that didn’t quite look like paint. It looked like blood.
Could Gareth kill to use his victims’ blood in his artwork? Seemed a weird reason to kill, but I guess to someone like him, it wouldn’t matter.
I had to get in there and see for myself, but how? He’d been waiting the last time I’d tried, almost like he knew I would go snooping. Would he anticipate me snooping again tonight? Or would he get into my room again, looking for me, wanting to be with me again?
Hmm.
I did what I could for my math homework, and then I locked myself in my own studio. I peeked out the window at the pool house often, and one time I spotted Gareth leaving it—and locking it with a key.
There’d be no slipping in tonight. I’d have to figure something else out. Maybe I could sneak into his room and steal the key? The question was: where did he put it?
That night, Emily wasn’t there. He’d said he’d fired her, but something deep inside told me that was a lie. I tried not to let the fact that she wasn’t there weigh on me, but it was damn near impossible. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was really wrong here.
This house. Gareth. The whole thing; it didn’t feel right. My mom might be riding cloud nine with her handsome, younger husband, but I was here on planet Earth, dealing with the very real possibility that we’d moved into the mansion of a murderer.
The housekeeper left around six, and I made myself a sandwich, which I brought upstairs to my bedroom. I kept my door cracked open, so I could listen for Gareth. When he slipped into the bathroom to shower for the night, I’d make a move.
