Page 4 of Now You See Him

Chapter

Four

I t had been two weeks since her sex dream that started with her trip to the basement.

She almost felt like she’d imagined the whole incident.

The only problem was that when she’d showered, she’d found fingerprint bruises on her thighs.

Her vagina had been swollen and sore as well.

It had been as if she’d actually been ravaged.

Her body had been tender, and her muscles had quivered like she’d been a virgin taken by a cock too big for her.

Those were very real experiences that marked her body.

It had to be her imagination, something she did to herself since Tina was alone in the house that night, unless some serial killer was hiding in her basement.

But that couldn’t have been it. There had to be another explanation.

She’d done her best to dismiss any thoughts of ghosts or paranormal nonsense.

She was even grateful for Logan’s return.

With him around, the bursts of cold against her arms, the odd pressure against her back, the feeling of constantly being watched, could be explained.

And at night, he’d be able to tell her if she was sleepwalking or something.

Except nothing remotely similar happened in the days that passed.

She continued to experience sex dreams that were too vivid to be anything but triggered by…

something. The touch of hands that were not her fiancé’s, the weight of a man that was muscled, heavier, more assertive than her fiancé, remained a constant presence in her life.

She always woke up in a cold sweat, to the sounds of Logan still snoring at her side with flashes of Derrick Sutter’s face in the shadows. Most nights, she was left unsatisfied.

She had to be experiencing some sort of a breakdown.

Even the melatonin she’d started taking had done nothing to protect her.

She’d need to go to the doctor and get something stronger if she had any hope of getting a dreamless night of sleep where she didn’t wake up terrified and horny at what was happening to her mind.

“Wow, you look exhausted.”

Tina looked up from her morning coffee, across the small table that she’d positioned in the kitchen area. Logan was reading the newspaper on his tablet, his gaze discerning.

“It’s…work,” Tina said. “I’m heading up a big project.”

“Oh, well if it’s too much to handle, then maybe someone else on your team can take care of it for you.”

“It’s not too much to handle,” she said, trying to keep the bite out of her tone. She knew that he was just trying to problem solve, just trying to help her. “I just need a nice hot shower and I’ll be as good as new.”

Logan snorted. “Good luck with that.”

“What do you mean?”

He put his tablet down. “Sweetheart, haven’t you heard my complaining about our damn water for the last two weeks?”

“I’m sorry, I…”

He waved her off. “Every time I try to shower, the water is ice-cold. I haven’t had a hot shower since coming back from New York. I almost want to go to the city just so I can know the feeling of warm water again.”

“That’s so strange, I’ve been showering in hot water this whole time,” she mused.

“Maybe you’re using up all of it,” he said.

He paused as he picked up his coffee mug.

“No, that’s not right. The last couple days, I’ve showered before you.

I think something’s wrong with our brand-new hot-water heater.

We should probably get someone out here to have a look at it.

I wouldn’t know the first thing about fixing it myself. ”

At that moment, the purse that she’d left on the kitchen island tipped over and crashed to the floor. Tina jumped out her chair, barely containing her scream.

Logan also got to his feet. “Whoa, are you okay?” he said. There was genuine concern on his face when he reached for her belongings to put them back in her bag. “I have never seen you so jumpy like this before.”

She didn’t want to tell him, to explain to him that she’d had sex in her dream and woke with bruises and signs that the sex was real.

Every time she went to bed, she was touched and stroked and kissed in a way that had her wound so tight but failed to reach an orgasm.

She didn’t want to admit that she saw a man’s face that wasn’t Logan’s when she closed her eyes at night.

“The sound just caught me by surprise,” she said as she picked up a lipstick tube that had rolled to bump up against her bare toes. Then she saw the card that had also slipped out of her bag and slid across the tile.

“What’s that?” Logan asked when she picked it up and rubbed her thumb over the simple lettering. derrick sutter.

“I, ah, met a contractor in town. He…ah, he did some of the renovations on the house.” She didn’t know why she didn’t want to tell Logan that Derrick Sutter sold her the house.

Maybe it was because her fiancé was freaked out when she wouldn’t agree to buy any other property except this one in the first place.

She didn’t want to deal with his berating again.

“Tina, why don’t you call him and ask him to check out the hot-water heater? Maybe he screwed up the install or something.”

Tina’s heart began pounding. She did not want to see Derrick Sutter again. “I, ah, should ask around to see if I could get a better quote from somewhere else.”

“What’s wrong with going to the one who gave you his card?” Logan asked.

“Nothing…I…nothing.”

As she sat back down in front of her half-empty coffee cup, she thought about what she had to do to just get her sanity back. Therapy? Self-medication? Or maybe it was the house. Maybe there was a ghost. That would require, what, a priest or some sort of exorcism?

Tina pinched the bridge of her nose. Maybe talking to Derrick would be like ripping off a Band-Aid. Maybe he knew something about the house that could shed some light on what was happening with her.

Logan got up and took his plate and mug to the sink. “Call him. Please. I can’t deal with this cold-water bullshit for much longer.”

“Fine,” Tina said. “I’ll call him today.”

“It looks like your hinges are fine,” Derrick said as he carefully swung the basement door back and forth. “You said the door was opening on its own?”

Tina nodded. “It’s happened a couple times now. I work from home, so I’m able to hear it happening.”

“Oh? What do you do?”

“Market research,” Tina said. “It’s a great remote job, which is how I could move out to Pennsylvania in the first place.”

He smiled, and it was beautiful to see. “You must know some interesting random facts.”

“I do,” she replied with a grin. “It’s actually my superpower.”

Derrick motioned to the phone in her hand. “You may want to check out Iron Fist Brewery. It’s a bar down in the village square. They have trivia on Tuesday nights.”

“Oh thanks, but sadly I’d be on my own, and I can’t face the inevitable judgment from the crowd if I show up as a team of one.”

“Well if you ever stop by,” Derrick said, “I’ll play a couple rounds with you. I also happen to be a whiz at trivia.”

“Really,” she said, cocking her head. Damn it, why did that make him so much more appealing? “I’ll keep that in mind.”

They looked at each other, staring for a heartbeat longer than was polite, before Tina motioned to the door.

“And, ah, the door creaks when I’m alone more often than not.

The last time I remember it happening was when my boyfriend, ah, I mean fiancé, was out of town.

I came into the kitchen to not only find the door open, but to also see that the lights had turned on downstairs. ”

She swore she saw him tense and the muscle in his jaw flex. However, his expression was blank, almost as if he was intentionally trying to hide his feelings from her.

He propped his hands on his hips, bringing attention to the thick waist, the narrow cut of his jeans that cupped his ass (not that Tina was looking) and his height. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbow and that tattoo was on display again.

“Derrick?” she said, distractedly.

“Yes?”

“Your tattoo looks…familiar. I’m just curious. Is it an original piece?”

There was wariness on his face, as if he knew she was asking about something other than the tattoo. “My brother and I have matching tattoos. Had . We had it designed together and started the sleeves on our twenty first birthdays. Twin brothers, twin tattoos.”

Brother. Twin. The person who owned the house before she purchased it.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean?—”

“It’s okay,” he said. “Really.” He shot her a crooked grin, and her cheeks began to heat.

Damn, she wished Logan were there. When she’d told him who the contractor was, he’d balked.

It was as if he’d recognized the name from somewhere.

Instead of sticking around to voice his complaints about the water heater, he’d run off to his mother’s house for what he called a quick visit and to stay out of Derrick’s way .

Which meant Tina was alone with a man who she had very dirty thoughts about.

“Do you want me to have a look?”

“Uhm, what?”

Derrick pointed down the stairs to the basement. “Tina, do you want me to have a look at the light? We have to head downstairs anyway for me to take a look at the hot-water heater.”

“Oh, ah, sure.”

He must’ve seen the way she hesitated, because the next words he said were laced with a soft patience. “You don’t have to come with me. I’ll be back in a minute.”

“No, I can’t avoid my basement because the light flickers and the door creaking is…unexplainable,” she said. “I’ve never been one to believe in the spooky things that go bump in the night.”

There was that jaw flex again, she thought. She was sure she saw him flinch this time. When he didn’t respond, she motioned to the stairs. “After you.”

He started down the stairs, his broad shoulders stretching across the width of the stairwell, filling up most of the space. After a beat, she slowly followed.