Chapter 14 14
POV Katherine
The doorbell pierced my skull like a rusty nail, over and over, relentless. I snapped my eyes open, and the world tilted in a whirlwind of nausea and blinding light filtering through the half-open curtains.
"What the hell...?" I murmured, but the words stuck in my dry throat, turning into a choked groan. My head throbbed with a dull ache, a furious pulse radiating from my temples to the base of my neck, as if someone had poured molten lead into my brain.
I tried to sit up, but the movement was a catastrophic mistake: the mattress sank under my unsteady weight, and I rolled off the bed like a sack of uncoordinated bones.
I fell to my knees against the cold wooden floor, and a sharp burst of pain shot up my right leg.
"Shit!" I hissed, cursing through clenched teeth as I clutched my knee. The skin had scraped against the sharp edge of the nightstand; a superficial scratch, but deep enough to stain my fingers with a thread of warm blood. I stayed there, kneeling, panting, the air coming in short, painful bursts that barely eased the tightness in my chest.
The doorbell kept ringing, insistent, like an executioner pounding on the door of my sanity.
Who the fuck was it?!
I blinked, trying to focus my vision, and then I noticed: I was naked. Completely, with nothing on my body, on the floor of my bedroom. My skin prickled at the touch of the morning air, nipples hardening from the cold—or maybe from the growing panic. I wasn't wearing anything. No lingerie, not even the fitted dress from the night before.
What the fuck had happened? I tried to dig into my memory, but I only found blurry fragments: laughter, pulsing music, the press of bodies on the dance floor. And then... nothing. A black void that terrified me.
The headache intensified, a throb that stole my breath, making every inhalation feel like swallowing broken glass. I doubled over, pressing my palms to my temples, but the doorbell didn't stop.
It was like a drill in my brain, amplifying every pulse until tears welled in my eyes.
"I'm coming, fuck! Stop already!" I screamed mentally, but my voice came out no more than a hoarse croak.
With a Herculean effort, I stood up, staggering like a wounded deer. My legs trembled, muscles protesting from the invisible exhaustion of the lost night.
Blindly, I groped the coat rack by the bed and found my silk robe—the only garment at hand, soft and slippery against my bare skin. I tied it at the waist with clumsy knots, the sash already loosening as I stepped into the hallway. The house, bathed in the merciless clarity of mid-morning sun, assaulted me like a photographic flash. The white walls bounced the light into my sensitive eyes, every ray a dagger stabbing into my skull.
I covered my face with one hand, groping my way down the narrow hallway, the scrape on my knee leaving a sticky trail of blood on the floor.
"Just... make it stop," I pleaded silently, descending the stairs with cautious steps, clinging to the banister like a lifeline. Each step was agony: the motion made my head loll, the world spinning in nauseating spirals.
I finally reached the front door, the doorbell buzzing in my ears like a swarm of wasps. I pressed my forehead against the cool wood, breathing deeply—or what could pass for a breath with my chest so tight.
"Please, let it be the mailman. Or a salesman. Anyone but..." I turned the knob with trembling fingers and yanked the door open, squinting against the outside light.
And there he was.
Elliot.
Shit.
Standing on the threshold, as if conjured from my worst—or best—nightmares. He held a paper bag in one hand, emanating a tempting aroma of freshly brewed coffee and toasted bread, and in the other, a bouquet of wildflowers—simple, messy, but vibrant with touches of red and purple that contrasted with his impeccable white shirt. A half-smile curved his lips, that damn crooked smile that made his eyes sparkle with a mix of amusement and something darker, more possessive.
The sun outlined his silhouette, making his tousled brown hair seem haloed, and for a second, it hit me how ridiculously handsome he was. Too handsome to be real.
"Good morning, Mrs. Ellis," he said, his voice a low, warm purr, as if we were in one of our usual lessons and not on the threshold of my house, with him invading my personal space once again.
I blinked, stunned, the headache pounding in sync with my racing pulse. What the hell was he doing here? Today wasn't a lesson day.
My mental calendar, blurry as it was, confirmed it. No tutoring scheduled for weekends. No excuse for my student—my student—to be planted at my door with breakfast and flowers, looking at me as if he knew exactly how to unravel me with a single glance.
"What... what are you doing here?" I stammered, my voice hoarse and broken, clutching the door like a shield. The robe slipped slightly off my shoulder, exposing the curve of my collarbone, and I felt a traitorous blush creep up my neck. Naked underneath, accessible, with the scrape throbbing on my knee and my tangled hair falling in wild waves over my shoulders.
His smile widened a little, his eyes descending over my body—quick, but deliberate—lingering on the loose sash of the robe, on the way the silk clung to my curves from the cold sweat of the hangover.