Page 214 of Ominous: Part 1

He shifts his arm up, around the back of my neck, and pulls me close, turning his head so his mouth is against my ear. “Are you afraid?”

There’s a tingling in my chest.

“No,” I say honestly.

“You told me being terrified is what made it real for you. In the water.”

It’s suddenly hard to breathe, even though his hold is loose.“Eli.”My face is pressed against the crook of his neck. I feel his body tremble with my breath ghosting over his skin.

“You said if you weren’t afraid,” he dips his head and nudges his nose to my throat, dropping his hand from my face and wrapping this arm around me, too, “I would’ve been doing it wrong.” He enunciates the last three words very, very clearly.

“This is about period sex.” I laugh a little because I mean to ease the tension as my eyes flutter closed.

I don’t even think he smiles. “No. This is about the fact you have only once asked if anything Dominic told you was true, and only about one of his revelations. You didn’t care I cut him. You didn’t get angry for him, or at me. You led him upstairs and took care of him, so he wouldn’t get me in trouble.” He smiles now. I feel the crescent on my skin. “Am I close?”

I don’t say anything. Truthfully, I meant to ask him about Dominic’s accusations, and I tried, with Idaho. But I let it go too easily. It didn’t seem the time to bring it up again, and timing is everything with Eli.

He runs his nose over my jawline, and I inhale his scent. Coconut and marijuana and citrus. Sweet and peppery and dangerous.

He arches his hips into me, and I push back against him. He groans the softest sound at my ear, like he couldn’t keep it in if he tried. “Did you mean it? I could do anything?”

I close my eyes a second, chin resting on his shoulder. I meant it.I mean it.“Yes,” I whisper, wondering what I’m getting myself into. But it’s not the first time I said it. I gave him a permission slip.

He pulls back and I do, too, our noses touching as we stare at one another.

“No one has ever understood me,” he says quietly. “And no one has ever really wanted to.” He licks my mouth, right in the center, flicking his tongue over the scar above my top lip.

My hips arch more, and I’m not thinking about the blood in this moment. The mess we could make of his white sheets.

All I can think about is how much I want him. How much I crave these words.

“Until you,” he finishes against my lips. “Open your mouth for me, Eden. This is just another level, right? I drug you, maybe you pass out. Maybe I fuck you. Maybe I take care of you. I mean, I’ll never stop doing that. Like I said,I protect you.Just trust me.” He turns his head, nose caressing mine. “Show me you won’t run.”

I think it over. What he wants to do. The mess of my medication on his floor. Another, bloodier mess.

I could give him a blowjob. I would love to try, actually. I lick my lips just thinking about him stretching them, secured tight around his cock, hitting at the back of my throat. I even have images of him pinching my nose closed while he fucks my mouth, saying mean things about not fainting and swallowing every last drop of him.

But I have a feeling if I suggested that, with the plan he has forming inside his beautiful, messed up brain right now, he would refuse.

He wants me to swallow all five pills. He wants to slow my heart and take advantage of the ensuing lethargy. And despite the left side of my brain screaming at me to get away from him, to talk myself out from under him, and run far, far out of his reach… I don’t.

Because the right side wants all the danger. The right side sees the romance in the darkness. And the right side believes if he lets us get this twisted, thenhewon’t run fromme.

I reach behind me, one hand still gripped in his hair, but I grab his arm.

I bring it slowly between us, clutching his wrist as he unfurls his fingers. I see all five pills there, and they won’t kill me, but my heart still thumps fast, like it knows it’s about to be stifled. The dose is low, though. It shouldn’t do too much to me. Likely, I’ll fall asleep. I say just that to Eli.

“Would you even care? If I fucked you while you’re unconscious?” The words are filthy, and I’m embarrassed, heat flooding my cheeks, but I still want it.

“No.” I whisper my consent, staring at the pills.

“Because you know I willalwayslook after you, even when you’re too fucked up to know I am.”

My throat grows tight. Being used like that, it turns me on, and I don’t hate that it does. I can get this nasty, with Eli.

“And afterward, I’ll sleep with you,” he says, as if it’s simple.

“Everyone downstairs…” It makes me feel uneasy, thinking of strangers down there while I’m knocked out on heart medication up here. Eli might take care of me, but I wouldn’t trust anyone else to.