A beep of an alarm brought me back to the present. The noise cut through the silence like a warm knife slicing through butter. I pushed up and made my way across the room with my oven mitts on my hands.
A burst of heat hit me as I opened the oven door. I pulled out the scorching hot tray, carrying it over to the counter where I rested them on a metal stand. Burning a hole in the expensive-looking marble probably wouldn’t win points.
A whiff of richness.
Deliciously assaulted by the rich chocolatey aroma drenching the air. Like a hit of happiness that soaked into my brain. The warm feelings I got in my stomach were followed by a pang of hunger. Mouth watering, I grabbed a spatula and then shoveled a cookie onto a plate. It had risen perfectly and was begging to be eaten.
Reaching into the fridge to grab the milk, I heard footsteps behind me.
“Making yourself at home,” his familiar husky tone said.
I refused to turn around and look at him. “Hardly,” I mumbled underneath my breath.
“What was that?”
I pivoted, unprepared to look up at that astonishing man. Damn, he looked good in a tight T-shirt and ripped jeans. Like a rock star on tour—all he was missing was an electric guitar—all hard muscle and messy hair. I wasn’t ready for these feelings to swirl as they always did when he was in close proximity.
I was not ready to be this close again.
The way he towered over me.
His cologne saturating my senses.
My knees weakened.
It was too much.
My flesh ignited as he closed the gap between us.
“Want a cookie?” I responded, my words making him look down at the plate in my hands. I continued to watch him, waiting for a smile, but instead, I was met with a look of disgust on his face.
“Trying to poison me?” he grunted.
A clever retort sat heavily on my tongue, but instead of saying it, I shut myself up by lifting the warm cookie and stuffing a giant bite in my mouth, dissolving into a hot mess of bliss. Chocolate chips played havoc with my tastebuds. I shuddered, my brain sending a silent message that the pleasure of this was probably nothing to the pleasure of him.
A long-drawn-out moan escaped my lips.
Flushing, as though he’d guessed my silent musing, I peered up at him.
He merely studied me, seemingly mesmerized by the way I licked the chocolate off my lips, sticky and thick. .
“I don’t recall you asking for permission to cook,” he said.
I took another bite and talked despite it. “If it wasn’t so good, I would spit it on you, but I’d hate to waste a perfectly good cookie,” I mumbled, mouth full. My mother would be disappointed with my poor manners.
“Unless you plan on eating all of them, they’re going to waste. No one in this house will eat something you made.”
His words stung, but regardless, I refused to let them bother me. Instead, I placed the plate of cookies down and took one of them with me before turning to look at him over my shoulder. “Your loss.” I shrugged and stormed away—stopping in my tracks suddenly when I’d made it just outside the door.
I wanted milk.
Turning back, I was about to reenter the kitchen when my step halted.
There he was.
Cassius.
A cookie in hand. And a smile on his face. He was taking another bite, and as he did, he groaned as he chewed with an expression of pure unadulterated bliss. Looking wickedly seductive.
A smile crossed my face as I stepped back into the kitchen.
“Busted!” I said, smirking.
He set the cookie on the plate and walked away from it. “Checking for poison.”
Watching him walk by me, I smiled at his boyish swagger and at the lowering of that wall of his, and the fact he had a chocolate chip on his very kissable lip.
Anya
Two days passed before I decided to brave the house in search of my captor. I had felt many different things after I’d found him eating the cookies I’d made.
One was confusion. How could he hide his enjoyment of it from me, and most of all, why?
What was the point?
Other than to torture me. Make me feel less. Not let me in.
I should be angry with him, but something stopped me. Maybe it was the sight of him standing there, looking like a normal man, eating what I’d baked. With nothing of the monster in him I’d believed him to be. That moment had humanized him. I’d witnessed him taking pleasure in something—as though I’d triggered a good memory. The boy glimpsing through the stark demeanor of a hurting man.
Cassius affected me in a way I didn’t want to think about.
I tried to avoid him as much as possible. Borrowing books from his collection in his library and taking them back to my room. It was killing me to do this, but I wasn’t ready to see him, and my conflicting feelings were getting the better of me.