Fuck.
Was I wrong? Is my obsession that acute?
I shove the drawer of her dresser shut and move on to her nightstand. It’s as neat, organized, and simple as everything else. There’s hardly anything here. No books or an e-reader. Just an old beat-up first-generation smartphone I can’t imagine works very well and her work phone. Both are plugged in andcharging, which seems odd to me, but maybe she doesn’t bring them with her when she eats.
That’s it on top, and when I slide the drawer open, it’s completely empty.
Frustration boils through me. I pick up her pillow, and there’s nothing under it.
“Arg!” I run my hands up my face and back through my hair. “Fuck!” I hiss under my breath. I grip her mattress and lift, my last-ditch effort, but there’s nothing here either. I go to set it down and get the fuck out of here when something in the far corner between the box spring and the mattress catches my eye.
A box.
I shift the mattress to one hand, holding up its weight as I reach underneath and strain for the box, fingering it and managing to shift it enough that I can grip it. The mattress falls back to the bed with a thud, the same moment I open the box.
The earring.
For a moment, all I can do is stare at it, my mind racing.
It’s her. I knew it, but this confirms it. I’m not crazy. It’s actually her.
A voice out in the hallway jerks me away from it, and I quickly close the box, lift the mattress, shove it back where I found it, and lower the bed, smoothing out the blanket to hide what I did.
I head for the door, pressing my ear to the wood and listening intently. Whoever was speaking is gone. I pull back and wait another moment to make sure, then I open the door and slam straight into Marcella, wearing nothing but a towel and a ratty pair of flip-flops. She’s holding a shower caddy that starts to fall from her hand. The towel cinched just above her tits gets the same idea and goes with it.
Naturally Marcella goes for the towel, and I go for thecaddy, catching it right before it fully slips from her hand and crashes to the floor.
“What the hell are you doing in here?” she shrieks, fury staining her cheeks and brightening her eyes.
I wince at her loud voice, but she doesn’t care.
“This is totally inappropriate and a complete invasion of my privacy.”
She’s not wrong, but I’m too fired up to care. She’s Ella. The woman I met at the wedding. The woman I danced with and couldn’t take my eyes off of for a moment. Not even a fucking moment. The way she kissed me, the way she moved, the sounds she made, her natural disdain for me, the way she tasted, how her virgin cunt felt.
I slam the door shut behind her and set the caddy on the floor, doing my best to ignore her wet body in only a towel, her wet hair, and her sweet face. She was beautiful that night at the ball. A showstopper. But the woman from that night has nothing on the woman in front of me. This one’s a heartstopper.
“Oh, you mean an invasion like cleaning my room and smelling my pillow, or going through a closed portfolio that was under a laptop and fishing through it?”
She looks away, her jaw locked tight, and her eyes narrowed. She tightens the towel on her chest, but she’s breathing heavily, her tits rising and falling, making the knot of the towel precarious at best.
“I admitted to that and apologized. What are you doing in here?”
“I was waiting for you.”
She laughs incredulously, her words accusatory as they slice at me. “Oh. And you weren’t snooping?”
I sure as hell was, but something is holding me back. I don’t know her motive. I don’t know who she’s working for. I just know something or someone sent her to the wedding andhere, and if I have her arrested, we may never know. She could clam up out of fear or spite or any other reason, and then we’ll never know what the true threat is. She could also lie to save her ass.
I can’t find Desta. Marie is a dead end. I’m the reason my father is dead, but I will make damn sure no one else hurts my family, and that starts with her.
“Snoop?” I scoff. “There’s nothing in here. A nun has more shit than you do.”
“So you were snooping?”
“You mean, did I open your closet? Yeah. I did that. I even opened your nightstand. Sorry to say there’s no vibrator in there.”
“Me too,” she snaps. “One has to have money to purchase such things.”
