Loving a Killer | 18+

1.9 - Head of the Snake

| Norah |

I opened my eyes, feeling the sun warming my face as I squinted my eyes to focus on my surroundings. My head was pounding as I lifted myself up to sit. I held my head and grimaced. It felt like I had the worst hangover imaginable.

I heard a shift to the right of me and turned to look at what had moved. On my sofa was Maddox, sitting up but his head slumped to the side, resting on his shoulder as he slept. I admired how harmless he seemed in his sleep, but watching him made my head hurt even worse.

"He's been there since last night," A voice told me from the door. I turned to see Matteo leaning against the doorframe.

Thinking about last night, I sat up and felt the throbbing pain in my head worsen as I grimaced. My wrist was stiff in a wrap. I inspected it and grimaced.

"Doc said you have a concussion and a dislocated wrist. We all were surprised you didn't regain consciousness when he had to put it back into place," Matteo frowned and shook his head, thinking about it. I looked back down at my wrist and felt sick even imagining the process of putting it back in place.

"Was it a clean hit?" I asked, trying to take the focus off of me. Matteo shrugged his shoulders.

"I guess you could call it that..." Matteo trailed off looking at his feet for a brief second before looking back up to me with a glum expression.

"I'm so sorry, Norah."

"Why are you apologizing?"

"I knew he wasn't going without a fight and stupidly I never thought to say anything. You shouldn't be in this position now," He continued with a guilty tone.

"Matteo, stop. None of this was your fault," I told him with a firm voice, making sure he believed it. The last thing I wanted was for anyone to be blaming themselves for last night.

Frankly, I just didn't want to think about it in general. Once the memories came into my mind, that's when the spinning started and my head began to throb.

I heard a stifled groan from the couch and we both looked over to Maddox to see him waking up. His floppy black hair looked tousled as he stretched.

"Morning sunshine," Matteo greeted him lightly. Maddox's response was a crack of his neck. Those blue-grey eyes found their way to me and he looked me over.

"How are you feeling?" He asked, his voice hoarse from sleep. I felt heat find itself settling in my abdomen and I barely realized he was asking me a question. I brought my eyes down to my wrist and played with the wrapping so I could focus on avoiding my face from heating up.

"Superb given the circumstances," I murmured, forcing an answer from my lips so an awkward silence wouldn't find itself over us.

Maddox forced a small smile my way, blatantly not feeling so happy. He brought his attention to Matteo.

"Matteo, can you give us a moment alone? I need to speak to Norah in private," He asked. Hearing him ask it in such a polite tone surprised me.

Matteo looked between us and finally shrugged, nodding to Maddox.

"Of course," Matteo agreed and left, closing my door on the way out. He must have assumed we needed privacy. I kept my comments to myself as I took my eyes off the now-shut door.