Page 19 of Addicted

I stood up and walked into the living room. There was a large flatscreen TV mounted on the wall, and I grabbed the remote from the coffee table and turned it on.

At least there was internet. I scrolled through the streaming services and picked something random to watch. I needed some kind of distraction or I was gonna lose my mind.

I didn’t even have my phone. I’d left it in my truck when I pulled up on Ish last night. My truck was probably still sitting where I left it, or maybe someone hadalready stolen it by now since I’d left the key in the ignition.

Everything was falling apart.

I curled up on the couch and tried to focus on the TV, but my mind kept drifting. To Ish. To Stone. To how the fuck I was gonna get out of this.

Hours passed. The sun moved across the sky, casting long shadows through the windows. I watched episode after episode of some show I wasn’t even paying attention to, my stomach growling louder and louder.

By the time the sun started to set, I was beyond pissed.

And that’s when I heard the sound of a car pulling into the driveway. A door slamming followed by footsteps on the front porch, then the lock turning.

Stone walked through the door, and I was on my feet immediately.

“Where the fuck have you been?” I snapped, storming toward him.

He closed the door behind him and just stood there, staring at me with that same emotionless expression he always had.

That made me even angrier.

“You left me in this fucking house all day with nothing to eat!” I continued, my voice rising. “I got a job, Stone. I got a life. I got bills to pay. I can’t just sit in this house all day and night waiting around for you to come back and fuck me whenever you feel like it! I don’t even have any fucking clothes to put on, I feel dirty as hell!”

He still didn’t say anything. Just stared at me like I was speaking a foreign language, then pulled out his phone and typed something before slipping it back into his pocket.

“Are you gonna say something?” I demanded, stepping closer to him. “Or are you just gonna stand there like a fuckin’ weirdo?”

That’s when he moved.

He crossed the room in two long strides, grabbed me by the throat, and slammed me against the wall so hard it knocked the breath out of me.

His face was inches from mine, his dark eyes boring into me.

“Shut the fuck up,” he said, his voice low and deadly, “before I kill you.”

I glared at him, my hands gripping his wrist, but I didn’t say anything else. I wanted to. I wanted to cuss him out, tell him to go fuck himself, spit in his face. But I couldn’t. Because if he killed me, Ish would have no one. And I needed to get back to my brother.

So I kept my mouth shut.

Stone stared at me for a long moment, his hand still wrapped around my throat, his grip firm but not quite choking me. And then he did something I didn’t expect.

He kissed me.

His lips crashed against mine, hard and demanding, and I froze for a second, shocked. He hadn’t kissed me before. Not once during all the fucking we’d done last night. But now he was kissing me like he was trying to consume me.

I kissed him back. I couldn’t help it. My body responded before my brain could catch up, my lips moving against his, my tongue meeting his in a battle for dominance.

He was an amazing kisser. His lips were soft but firm, his tongue skilled, licking and sucking and bitingat my bottom lip in a way that made my knees weak.

He pulled back, staring into my eyes with that same intense look that made me think he was a fucking crazy person.

“Take your clothes off,” he said.

I didn’t move fast enough, so he did it for me.

He stripped me roughly, yanking my crop top over my head, unbuttoning my jeans and pulling them down along with my panties. He didn’t bother with my bra. He just pulled it down, freeing my breasts.