Ignition (The Redline Series 1)

Chapter 3

Aubrey

My head seemed full of sand when I woke, so I didn't dare open my eyes. Everything was strangely quiet—given that my apartment complex was usually a hotbed of parties, loud music, drunken sex, and children fighting around the clock. As I lay there, all I could hear was the sounds of the busy city streets and that seemed like crickets compared to a normal morning. I took advantage of the uncharacteristic peace and pulled the sheets tighter around me, the world wasn't infringing on my rest and so I wasn't ready to face it yet.

Then, glimpses of the night before began seeping in around the edges. The last thing I remembered with clarity was getting ready to walk out on stage. I didn't remember leaving the club—or even how I got home.

I rolled over and noticed that the sheets smelled musky and unfamiliar, so I slowly opened my eyes, taking in the pale room. Blinds covered the large window at the side of the bed where muted light streamed in, broken up by the dark shadowed lines of the fire escape.

My heart thudded as I clenched the sheets—naked and alone in a foreign room.

Sitting up, I held the sheet to my chest. A pair of men's jeans were tossed over the side of a hamper, and a T-shirt hung from the foot board. They were the only clothes in sight, so I quickly pulled the shirt over my head. At least it gave me some covering. I slid my leg over the edge of the bed, but the floor let loose a tiny squeak announcing my movement as soon as my foot hit the floor.

Slow, steady footsteps approached the bedroom door, and it opened revealing an oddly familiar man. My brain clunked like a computer searching through a damaged drive. The information was there somewhere but fragmented among images of men, flashes of lights, and the sounds of loud music.

The man in the private room.

"Two scotches," I said softly.

"You remember," he lifted an eyebrow but didn't seem all that pleased. In fact, for someone who I assumed had brought me home, he looked rather irked for me to be there. Unless he had been nearly as out of it as I apparently was.

"Did we...?" Stupid question. Naked in a man's bed—I'd know. I'd have to know.

He shrugged, his eyes traveling a slow path down my form to my naked legs. It didn't matter that I was half covered, his gaze—that look on his face—made me feel vulnerable, utterly naked, and violated.

I tried to remember—to put the pieces back in place. "Did you give me something? I don't—"

Sure, start off by accusing the strange man who has you trapped in his bedroom of drugging you.

His laugh was dry, but the edge of his lip crinkled up as if amused by the accusation. "No, I don't play that rouse."

"I wasn't drinking." My mind continued in slow motion, but my heart thudded in a quick juxtaposition, filling my ears with a pounding static that made the room spin.

"You were drinking something I'd wager."

"Only water...." I dropped my gaze to the bed, tucking my leg back under the sheet—my only protection. The bottle of water...that's when I had begun to feel hazy. "Devlin. Why?"

"Ah, she's catching on," he mocked, walking in a long, lazy arc around the bed, never taking his eyes off of me. "You are on birth control right?"

My heart stuttered and I gasped for air. Oh, Lord. "What—I—No."

His face twisted into a scowl, but his intimidating approach continued unfettered.

What had I done? Somehow, yet again, I landed in deeper. And I couldn't even for the life of me remember how.