Under His Domain by Kelly Favor

 
    Time had never moved so slowly.
    Easton was gone, and he was with
dangerous people, people who might hurt him.   She never should have let him go.
    Kennedy got dressed in her old clothes,
not having anything else to change into, and tried to wait patiently for
Easton’s return.
    She set the timer on her cell phone and
told herself not to check it very often.   She told herself that he would surely be home in a few hours at the
latest.   Downstairs, she made coffee
and turned on the lights as she watched out the windows, seeing nothing but
darkness outside.
    The coffee was dark and somewhat bitter
in her mouth, and she shivered every few minutes from a deep chill in her
bones, and the nervous energy coursing through her system.
    Easton had gone away in the middle of the
night with such a strange warning—telling her the combination to his
private safe.   She would never open
that safe and take his money and run as he’d instructed her to do if he didn’t
return.
    Kennedy wasn’t going to simply flee and
hide, especially not if Easton might be held captive or hurt somewhere, needing
her help.
    Calm
down, Kennedy.   He’s not going to be kidnapped or hurt.   He’s going to be just fine.   Easton Rather is a man who can take care
of himself.
    So she waited, talking to herself first
inwardly and then, as she felt more desperate, out loud.   “He’s fine.   He’ll be home soon.”
    Kennedy paced around the first floor,
unable to sit down.   Time was moving
both slowly and quickly all at once.
    In her mind, rapid images flashed one
after the other.   Easton, smiling at
her as he cooked food over the stove—Easton naked in bed, looking into her
eyes—Easton fighting the thugs who’d come to hurt her—Easton
standing up to Red Jameson in his office…and then, somehow, her mind flashed on
an image of Easton with a bullet wound in his eye, and nothing but an empty
socket where the eye should have been.
    Kennedy cried out at the vivid image of
Easton dead, feeling in her gut that he’d been taken from her, taken from this
world before his time.
    I
never should have told him about Dean and his troubles with the mob.   I’m the one responsible for Easton’s life
being in jeopardy.   I’m the
problem—I’m the cause of all the bad things that have happened to him.
    Why
did I ever come to New York?
    Tears poured down her cheeks and Kennedy
did nothing to wipe them away.   Time
was passing and still no sign of him.   She stared out the window at the street and saw people beginning to
emerge into the very early morning air to start their days.
    Trucks passed by, ready for their first
deliveries.
    Life was beginning again, which meant
that far too much time had gone by, and something was very wrong.
    Kennedy went back to the kitchen and sat
down, her leg jittering beneath the table as she tried to control her frantic
anxiety, her racing thoughts, the fear that was building in her chest like a
dam about to burst.
    As she sat alone at the kitchen table
drinking her third cup of coffee, and the light from the rising sun dawned and
then streamed through the large windows of the townhouse, her nerves became
more and more frayed.
    Where
is he?   He could at least call me.
    She checked the time on her cell
phone.   It was now 7:20 a.m. and
there was no sign of him.   He’d told
her to take the money from his safe and leave if it got this late in the day.
    It hit her suddenly that this was a very,
very real emergency, and she had absolutely nobody to turn to.
    You
have to at least text him, call him, see if he answers
you.  
    Kennedy took a deep breath and let it
out.   She was afraid to try and
contact him and get nothing back.   What if he was really gone?
    Waiting was safe.   She could keep telling herself that
Easton would come home soon.   Maybe
the meeting had gone on a long time, maybe—
    Her fingers seemed to take on a life of
their own, finding the right letters to the words and then hitting