Criminal for You |On Hold|

Chapter 9: Confessions

Summer's POV

"What do you mean you..." I squeaked, but my voice trailed away and died down as his dark, breath-taking green eyes kept its focus on me. 

Okay, this isn't fair. All he needs to do is look at me like that and my body goes numb. Oh, c'mon!

Let me re-assess the situation. Damon is in my house. In my bedroom. He saw the note I left him. And perhaps he's here to kill me. 

I bent down to pick up the piece of paper. Without making eye contact with him, I opened it up. Yup, it was exactly what I thought it was. In my own handwriting, the question "what were you doing after school?"  was written in bold, black ink.

I crumpled up the paper and took a few steps away from him to toss it into the bin. I stayed in that area near the window, looking out of it and avoiding Damon's eyes the whole time. "Well?" I demanded weakly. "Where were you?" My heart thumped expectantly. Is this the part where everything goes wrong?

"No, little miss sunshine, that's now how things work around here," he scoffed. My eyes flicked to his as an impulse. The expression on his face is hard to decipher.

"Where's Milk?"

I sucked in a breath. "Cookie," I blurted out, of all the things.

He began to near me. "What?"

"I said... I said..." Oh for goodness sake! Speak, woman!

He was so very close to me now. And I am so very intimidated.

If I jump out the window right now, what are my odds of surviving? Well.. I guess I'm dead either way, whether I jump out or stay here under Damon's piercing gaze.

He's not quite angry yet, but I'm sure that that's going to change at any moment now. 

Sometimes I feel as though my body is wired in all the ways that will lead me to my death instead of my survival. For an example, what I'm about to do is aggravate my enemy with newfound contempt instead of easing myself out of this situation.

"Her name," I spat, "is Cookie."

He bit his lip. In that one ethereal moment, I suddenly noticed just how sharp his jawline was, those angled cheekbones of his, the bulky muscles on his toned body.. uh oh. Muscles. Something used to beat a human into pulp if you feel like it.

"I have a proposal." He folded his arms, making his biceps bulge. It wasn't helping that he was wearing a vest. No, not helping at all. 

"A.. proposal?" If this were a movie and I was the scared victim, I'd get an Oscar. My fear has quickly returned. 

He rolled his eyes. "Calm down, I'm not going to eat you." I looked at him, thinking that.. well, maybe he is a cannibal. You never know. "Why don't we call her Oreo?" He grinned, snapping me out of my thoughts.

I blinked at him, taken aback. "Oreo?" My mind felt like a blank reel, just rolling and rolling without any real information to process. Suddenly, it hit me. I gasped and laughed, "Wait, I know why!"

He leaned his hand against the window-frame. Damon easily towered over me (he must be somewhere around 6 feet tall), making me back down against the window pane. My laughter died down as I began to feel a bit alarmed. "Do tell."

I tried to go back to my previous hatred for him, but in this moment it wasn't really working. I have to admit, he is a bit of a genius for coming up with that name.

"Well.. milk and cookies go together, and the best cookie with milk is an oreo, and she's a black and white kitten." 

He smiled at me again, and this time I noticed a dimple on his left cheek. I stared at it for a second before I reminded myself that I'm in a very weird situation. "Also, you're really invading my personal space!"