But as my gaze sweeps across the snowy woodland, he’s already gone. He’s disappeared into the surrounding trees and snow as quickly as he’d appeared.
I plop back down into the snow, chest rising and falling as I fight to catch my breath.
What the hell just happened?
CHAPTER FIVE
I makeit back to the main house still in a daze. My dampened coat clings to my skin, half-frozen at the edges, the lining soaked through with sweat and snow. My breath fogs in uneven bursts, each inhale sharp and shallow.
I can’t tell if I’m shivering from the cold or from what happened only minutes ago.
It still doesn’t even feel real.
The steps leading onto the terrace are crusted in ice. I catch myself on the rail, boots slipping as I haul myself up, one hand fumbling for the doorknob, the other still pressed against my stomach as if I’m trying to keep from spewing.
The door slides open with warm air immediately enveloping me—from the flames in the fireplace and the centralized heating.
It should feel comforting; it should be some form of solace after being out in the frigid cold for so long.
But it has the opposite effect. It only makes me shiver harder. It’s as if my body’s gone into shock.
I don’t stop in the entryway or bother taking off my boots. I stumble through the living room until I reach the stairs in the hall and then make my way to my room.
It couldn’t have been real. I must’ve imagined it the same way I’d imagined the noises last night in the house.
“Get it together,” I whisper. I peel off my coat and toe out of my boots, coming before the mirror in the room for a look at my reflection.
The girl staring back at me doesn’t seem so convinced.
Her complexion is washed out, eyes wide and pupils dilated, curls stuck to the side of her face.
There’s a scrape on her jaw from where a branch caught her. A smear of dirt on her cheek from the frantic running in the woods.
…and a startling pulse between her thighs as she remembers the feel of his thick fingers inside her.
Exactly why I need to wash this off; I need a hot shower to wash away any thoughts and evidence of what happened.
The water is scalding, steam rising in thick clouds. I stand under the spray until my skin prunes and the sting from the heat chases away the numbness.
The stress must be getting to me. That’s all.
It was an overreaction to the unease and anxiety I’ve been feeling, my brain chemistry responding in kind. Hallucinations aren’t unheard of in situations like this.
Shirtless men in Santa Claus pants and a mask with giant antlers don’t appear out of thin air; they damn sure don’t chase women in the woods and play with their pussy, all while grunting in their ear.
It was a hallucination that went too far.
But I have a deadline. A job to complete. People are depending on me. Enough spiraling in some self-induced meltdown.
I said I would decorate Mr. Taylor’s estate, and that’s what I’m going to do.
Twenty minutes later, scrubbed raw and wrapped in a towel, I emerge from the steamy bathroom with a fresh sense of resolve. I’ll eat, then get some rest and reset.
The game plan seems like the perfect strategy until I see what’s resting on the bed. I stumble to an abrupt stop, gaze falling on the center of the bed.
The same exact spot where I’d found last night’s gift, only today there’s a different present waiting for me.
It’s small and square, wrapped in satin ribbon and a bow on the top.
