Page 14 of He Should Be Mine

He pulls his shorts down. Or is it up because he is upside down? Either way, I can now see enough to know he is hairless everywhere.

“Molly!” I growl as I jump to my feet.

He laughs and lets go of his shorts. They ping back into place. Covering him up. Obscuring the view.

“Go to your room!” I bark.

Molly stops laughing. Anger lines mar his forehead. “What? Can’t you take a joke?”

I glare at him and wait for him to see how fucking serious I am.

He spins the right way round. “Stop sending me to my room. I’m not a fucking toddler!”

“Then act like it!”

“Fuck you!” His blue eyes are blazing with fury.

“Get in your room,” I say coldly. “I won’t tell you again.”

Molly snarls. He bends down. He snatches up the heavy crystal ashtray. He throws it at my head.

I manage to duck just in time. The ashtray smashes on the marble floor behind me. Pieces are skittering everywhere.

His eyes widen. He leaps over the back of the sofa just as I lunge for him. The little shit. I chase him around the room, but he is far too fucking quick. And nimble. And he keeps throwing things at me.

I swear and duck and swerve. My knee screams in protest, but I ignore it just like I always do.

Molly skids on a piece of shattered ashtray, losing his balance momentarily. I seize the moment and throw myself forward, rugby tackling him to the floor. I flip him over and we freeze.

I’m pinning him down onto the floor. He is panting hard, eyes wide. We both know it’s over. He may be fast, but I’m bigger than him. And far stronger.

He stares up at me with fear in his pretty blue eyes. It’s not the mellow fear of someone who has led an easy, sheltered life. He’s not looking at a spider or bracing himself for public speaking.

I know that look in his eyes. I’ve felt it before. Real fear. Primal. The fierce screaming of instincts as the memory of every life and death situation you somehow survivedcomes flooding back. The bone deep terror you only feel when you’ve already felt death’s cold breath down your back and it feels like this time your luck isn’t going to hold and death isn’t going to let you escape.

My lungs stutter and suddenly all my anger is draining away. The flames of my rage splutter out. Extinguished by a dark press of gravity. As if the void has poured into me and crushed everything it found.

I was furious whilst chasing him. Now I’ve caught him, all I feel is hollow.

I get to my feet. At least adrenaline is now forcing my knee to behave. I pull Molly up and frog march him to his room. He doesn’t resist. I shove him in, slam the door and lock it.

An eerie silence consumes the apartment. Heavy and oppressive. I can feel it in my lungs and I don’t like it at all.

I look around at the debris. Glass from the ashtray. Porcelain from a vase. China from my coffee cup.

The cleaning lady isn’t due for a couple of days. I could call her, but that’s risking gossip.

A heavy sigh escapes me. At least now I have something to do.

Chapter five

Dario

The city is busy tonight. The distant hum of traffic seems louder. Flashes of blue lights from emergency vehicles dance across the white walls more often than usual.

Here, inside the apartment, everything is calm and quiet. Molly and I are curled up on the sofa again, that same aching space between us.

The lights are low. They make the half-finished bottle of Chianti look better than it is. It sits on the coffee table. Halfway between us. Framed by our wineglasses.