Chapter 10 – Handcuffs
Visiting Brian so much in the past couple days had refreshed Dom's brain, allowing him to sleep for hours on end until he actually felt energized. His sleeping schedule fell back into its original pattern of about seven hours—from midnight to seven. Sure, he had the nightmares where Letty's face swam tantalizingly before him, just out of his reach. If it wasn't random images of her that tortured him, it was the nightmare he'd had the night before the shooting. Every night this happened he woke in a cold sweat, panting like someone had rammed a wrecking ball into his gut. He would kick off the blankets, stumble weakly over to the window and thrust it open, allowing the cool breeze to dry his skin. He would fall asleep holding the ledge and wake up a couple hours later to blazing sunlight.
As for now, Dom lay under his Civic, tweaking things here and there and drilling his prisoner with questions. So far he'd learned that her mother was a nurse at Brian's hospital, that she herself held a steady job at one of the local newspapers as a photographer (with a salary of $37,000 a year), that she had one twenty-six-year-old brother—Austin—who now lived in Brownsville, Texas, and that she had an addiction to adrenaline. She didn't seem to want to reveal any more than that, however. She stopped talking as soon as Dom brushed on the subject of Brian.
"Have you ever been here before?"
He'd thought that question would be a little too close, but didn't have time to rethink it before it was out of his mouth. Her jaw clenched shut with an audible snap and she turned her face around to glower at the cement bench she was cuffed to. Not in time for him to miss the green and yellow and purple bruises that had blossomed over the side of her face and around her neck in the last five days.
"What?" he asked innocently. He tried playing dumb, sliding out from under the car to gaze at her questioningly.
Her bluish-grey eyes flickered toward him, then away again.
"I'm starving," she growled. As if in agreement, her stomach rumbled loudly. "I'm gross. I haven't showered in days."
Dom's lips curled into a cruel smirk. "You should have thought about that before," he repeated.
"Fine." She sealed her lips shut.
With the motion, Dom sighed. "You're not going to talk until I feed you and let you shower."
She blinked and he sighed again. Hauling himself to his feet, he stretched and stepped through the open garage door, into the California sunshine.
"Stay," he mumbled, and trudged to the kitchen.
He'd already eaten not an hour ago, so he wasn't very hungry. He picked grumpily through the fridge, not wanting to humor her. Finding the food to nourish her wasn't the hard part, it was actually nourishing her, and not just letting her sit there, miserable, starving. Dom could almost taste sweet revenge on his taste buds when he pictured her body limp and weak, skin strained against the bones, on the verge of death. So tempting was this image that he grabbed two slices of bread, a Kraft Single, poured a cup of water, and with a sarcastic grin on his lips, strutted out to the garage.
The hopeful look in her eyes almost made him feel guilty—almost. When he swaggered through the door, her head jolted up from absently inspecting the floor and her nose twitched like a rabbit's. Upon spotting the pitiful meal, she instantly turned her back, twitchy nose in the air. But not before Dom could spot the dead look in her eyes. He set the paper plate in front of her and slid back under the car.
"There you go."
"You're kidding me, right?" she scoffed. "I can't eat that."
"Sure you can," he encouraged darkly. "Pick up, place in mouth, chew, swallow, repeat. You shouldn't underestimate yourself. It's not healthy."
A sharp, grating exhale told Dom she'd snorted.
"I'm lactose intolerant, you jerk."
"No you're not," he sneered, picking up a wrench, relishing the cool feel of metal in his hands.
"Fine, I'll just eat it and then go into anaphylactic shock. Are you going to tell them you forced me to eat cheese with a dairy allergy when I'm dead?"
"You won't go into anaphylactic shock from eating cheese."
"Uh-huh! If you're lactose intolerant!"
"Nuh—" Dom shook his head clear, disbelief for what he was just about to say rattling his insides. "Whatever! Then don't eat it. Eat the bread."
It was quiet for a second.
"Does it have milk in it?"
Dom groaned and rolled out from under the vehicle, glaring at her. "I don't know!"
"Well, I'm not taking any chances. This is my life we're talking about."
"You shot my friend, why would I care about your life?" he growled.
She fixed him with an intense, burning gaze. One filled with triumph. "Because my life is the one you need, right? For questioning?"
Caught. She'd caught him in his own side. Like a freaking spider web. It was a wonder she wasn't a lawyer. Huffing and puffing, his fists clenched on the hood of the Civic, Dom fumed for a little more before cooling down.
"Fine," he snapped, bending down to unlock her cuffs, gripping her both wrists with a steely grasp in a hand the size of a grizzly's paw. "Fine. You come with me, into the kitchen, and then I'll take you upstairs to shower. You will not touch anything, you will not try to escape, or I will kill you."
The blazing in his irises seemed to convey the message, as she stood up silently. For good measure, Dom slapped one cuff around his own arm and then the other around hers. He practically dragged her out of the garage, up to the house, and into the kitchen, nearly steaming out the ears. They were quiet as she surveyed the tiny room.
"It's really small," she complained.
"Shut up!" he barked, jerking his wrist violently so that she flopped like a fish.
"Ow," she whined, rubbing the scarlet skin around the steel cuff. "You nearly ripped my arm off."
"You can survive with one," he snarled. "Now. What can you eat?"
"Meat, fruit, bread—most of the time—" She ticked the list off on her fingers, staring thoughtfully at the ceiling as she spoke. "Veggies, eggs…."
"Here." He tossed a small piece of cold chicken her way and an apple.
With impressive reflexes, she caught the flying food and swiftly brought the chicken to her mouth. Her teeth tore into it like a lioness's, blue-grey eyes shining. Dom withdrew a cup from the cupboard and held it under the faucet, filling it three-fourths of the way to the top. She accepted it ravenously and downed the clear liquid, making gulping sounds as it traveled down her throat. She took a slower time with the apple, obviously trying to elongate the moment, maybe to trick her brain into thinking she was eating more. Incredibly, to his disgust, Dom's stomach twisted guiltily.
"Hurry up." Yelling made him feel a little better.
But of course, like she knew what it did to his conscience, she slowed down considerably. She must've been satisfied enough to return to annoying him.
"If that thing isn't gone in the next minute I'm throwing it away."
She looked him up and down, considering the threat. His expression was stony enough to convince her and she took a giant bite of the fruit. Once nothing but the core was left—and she worked around that until it barely existed—she tossed it in the trash and allowed Dom to yank her up the stairs and into the bathroom.
"You know, it'd be kind of awkward if we were both in there," she said pointedly, jerking her elbow toward the shower and dropping her head to stare accusingly up at him from under her messy maroon bangs.
Dom glanced at the window and back at her, then folded his arms across his chest, causing her to stumble closer, arm held out at an odd angle.
"We don't have to both be in there."
"Uh," was all she said, shaking her wrist so the chain connecting them rattled.
He glared blankly at her.
"Then you're going to have to re-move this," she elaborated, shaking the chain again and emphasizing the two syllables in the word 'remove'.
"Not in your lifetime."
"Then how do you propose I shower?"
Again, he remained silent, though a small smirk played with the corners of his mouth. He was enjoying torturing her.
"Oh." She blinked in realization. Her face pulled into a disbelieving grimace. "You jackass."
She twisted the knob toward 'hot' with her free hand and began to undress. Throwing a nasty glower his way, she pulled off her socks.
"You better hide your eyes," she grumbled through her teeth.
"Wouldn't dream of any other way," he retorted, averting his gaze though his eyes were already clenched shut. He stretched his arm out to create the biggest distance between them and clasped his other hand over his eyes. The brush and light weight of cotton fabric suddenly hung on his wrist and, as moisture from the steam beaded on his skin, he felt his face flush, listening to the gush of water from the faucet turn into a sprinkling rush from the showerhead. The consistent shhh-ing of the water was abruptly interrupted by a female body, stepping into the line of fire.
God, how he missed Letty.
A/N: Hey! I AM BACK! WOO! lol. i've been so busy lately, i've just been here and there and back to here and then all the way over there and it's just been crazy hectic but i'm BACK and so you all know, it is all because of YOU! my readers! *tear* I LOVE YOU GUYS! and how 'bout a special shout-out to Emma Rose23, the one reader that's persistently checked with me to keep me going. she had major influence on my return! so thank you! =D applause, applause! well deserved! =) mad hearts!