I sit quietly in the brightly lit room, feeling the hard metal chair beneath me, the concrete floors beneath that. My eyes focus on a darkened stain. Blood? Rust? A combination of both?
How many prisoners have come through this very room, sat in the very chair across from me? How many family members, friends, loved ones, enemies have sat in the very chair I sat in, waiting impatiently, anxiously for the prisoner to arrive.
How many victims?
Not many, I had been told by my lawyer, which was why he was so against my visit today.
It had been a month since the trial. A month since my former lover had been sent to prison—a month since I was the sole witness to the case that sent him here.
It wasn't as though he had denied any of it, though. He had gloated. Smiled. Fucking smiled as he recounted the feeling of his fists soaring across Anthony Newton's face. His bright green eyes, enigmatic and alive with the memory, had found mine as I sat in the back row of the court, hoping he would not have a chance to see me, to speak to me before I gave my testimony.
Of course, he had. He always had been able to find me. No matter where I went, no matter who I was with, he managed to find me.
This time it was Anthony, my live-in boyfriend. Last time it was James, and then Eric, and then Laurent. The cycle is never ending. He wants me, and he is desperate to have me through any means necessary.
The sound of a metal door clicking open pulls me from my reverie, my body jolting into the present, my spine straightening the way Rosalie had told me to sit.
"Confidence, Dahlia," she had said. "Don't let him think you have any thoughts left for him."
Easier said than done.
Especially when he shuffles into the room in a brightly colored, orange straight jacket. It looks better on him than it should. He looks better than he should. My lawyer had convinced me that he would be getting what was coming to him in prison. He'd be beaten mercilessly by the other prisoners, controlling on the outside, but weak to the inside gangs and nobodies. Clearly, this was not the case.
He looks as though he is striving.
His green eyes pierce me as he holds out his arms, waiting for the guard to release the cuffs. I have half a mind to ask him to leave them on, but I don't want to give him that kind of power.
"Ten minutes," the guard barks, shoving him towards the small, metal table in the middle of the room.
My eyes follow the guard as he leaves as much space as he could, standing just beside the door. He becomes immobile, still as a statue and stares straight ahead. He must be used to this.
I ignore him for as long as I can as he pulls out the chair that suddenly looks too small for his tall stature, his long legs having to bend at the knee just so they wouldn't collide with the corner of the table. I study his arms, exposed beneath the turn up of the long sleeves. Even his forearms look different. Harder, smoother. It seems he has been working out—and he had already been in pristine shape.
Finally, he makes a small noise in the back of his throat. One of amusement. One of contentment.
"Couldn't stay away?" His voice is just as velvety as ever, just as pleasing to my ears, but my eyes snap to his in annoyance.
Staying away from him is hardly the problem.
He has a five o'clock shadow forming across his jaw, chiseled as it had always been and I have a vivid memory of the way that stubble felt as it rubbed against my inner thighs.
YOU ARE READING
TEN MINUTES
Romance"Can you answer my one question?" he asks desperately, his fingers running through his hair again. "Did you ever love me?" The air that leaves my lungs surprises even me, and I almost want to laugh. "Of course I did," I answer. "That was the probl...
