From our first interaction on the dance floor the night of Shaun’s party…to last Friday night when we’d been celebrating the Panthers’ football championship at Josh and Layla’s home.
Some of the shots had perfect resolution. Others were blurry, captured quickly to avoid getting caught. All of them were taken in discreet angles and always when Hunter and I seemed wrapped up in each other, the outside world faded.
There was no way for us to have realized we were being photographed, let alone watched.
The shot that made me nauseated was the one from Halloween night. Hunter and I had just finished making love in the woods when we heard a noise nearby. I naively assumed it was one of the guards patrolling the area, who got too close to us before retreating.
But no.
It was Tom,stalkingus from the very beginning.
My haunted gaze rose to his and he gave me a glare. “You wasted no time, did you? The minute I ended it with you, you hopped on the next available dick.”
My nostrils flared. “So let me get this straight. You decided to end things with me by using Morgan to get back at me? But then you get mad that I didn’t give a shit and—”
“Yes, you fucking bitch! You were supposed to care!” he spat, throwing his arms up in the air. “Not move on with my captain and search for each other’s tonsils on the dance floor! You fucked up by kissing him, Gabriela. So I broke into your apartment with the spare key I had made to leave you a warning…and you failed to heed it.” His voice pitched low to a baleful level. Of course the English major would use Shakespearean quotes as taunts. Fucking classic. “And not only that, but you actively dated Hunter after telling me you weren’t a relationship kind of girl. Watching you fall in love with him made me hurl! It should have been me with you! Not him! If I had a proper opening and you weren’t being surveilled by a guard, I would have punished you weeks ago.”
I seethed as the puzzle pieces clicked into place. Had my parents not taken the precaution to protect me, had Oscar not been guarding me, had Hunter not been there for me twenty-four seven…this sick fuck would have hurt me a long time ago.
All this time, Tom feigned nonchalance whenever we were in the same vicinity, giving off the impression that he didn’t care that I was with Hunter since he broke up with me. But really, he was bubbling with anger on the inside and planning revenge. “Now what’s your big plan? Spend all your free time stalking me from the shadows so you could what? Stab me to death? Profess your undying love? Win me back in your own fucked-up way? Tell me!”
My sentence ended on a screaming note.
Tom pinned me with flinty eyes. “Yes, I stalked you. Yes, I love you. And no, that knife wasn’t meant for you.” His jaw clenched. “It was for Hunter. You’re mine and he touched you—hesulliedyou. Which meant he couldn’t go on living. My only regret is that I missed the mark.”
I wanted to vomit. “You’re fucked up, Tom. Never in a million years did I think you’d turn out this way.”
A cruel laugh rumbled out of him. “You made me this way. Like I said, it’s your fucking fault.”
I turned my head when his spit flew too close to my face.
“Had that idiot bodyguard of yours not stepped out to take a piss, I’d have resorted to shooting the tires. Either way, we would have found our way here. My PI spent all weekend searching for you. Hiding out in a safe house was a good idea, I’ll give it to you. But there’s nowhere you can go where I wouldn’t find you, Gabriela.”
He said it in a creepy sing-song manner that amplified my bloodthirst.
I licked my lips. It beckoned Tom closer. Good. I needed him in arm’s length for what I was about to do. “If Hunter and I were your main targets, why kill Morgan? What role did she play in this?”
“She was collateral damage.” He shrugged like this news was no biggie—like his lover wasn’t lying dead next to me by his own hands. “Sure, she was a good fuck, but too clingy for my taste. I was going to end it with her soon anyways. What I didn’t expect was for her to show up at my home unannounced today. She caught me going through the pictures in my room and had the audacity to say I was fucking crazy for stringing her along while being obsessed with you. Claimed I should be locked up in an asylum for stalking you.” He chuckled like this situation was actually funny. “She was trying to give you a call to warn you, but I caught her as she walked away. Never expected her to be a fighter, but she fought me for a total of eleven minutes. At first, I was just going to tie her up until I dealt with you and Hunter. But then…I realized she was a loose end.” The amusement slippedoff his face in the flash of a lightning bolt. “And loose ends always have to be disposed of.”
I shuddered, a sharp pang travelling through my chest. Poor Morgan. I imagined the pain and shock she must have felt at discovering that the guy she was seeing was deranged. Right before he killed her. She didn’t deserve this. At all. And even though we rarely saw eye to eye, she still attempted to call me.
Now we’d never be able to mend what lay broken between us because she was dead.
“There’s a special place in hell for men like you,” I spewed at Tom. “You’re a fucking piece of shit.”
“And you’re mine,” he stated matter-of-factly. “But I no longer want to fuck you now that Hunter’s had his dick inside of you. Which leaves me with only one choice.” His face darkened. “I have to kill you…and myself.”
If I could go back in time, I’d never give this psychopath the time of day. The fact that I slept with him made me sick to my stomach.
He crept close and I firmly gripped the blade in my hand, readying myself.
Just a little bit closer…
Tom crouched in front of me again and clasped my face with a dirty palm. A ragged sound erupted from my lips. “I dug us both a grave. Our final resting place won’t be in my family’s mausoleum, but six feet beneath the ground, right next to each other, where our bones can lie together until the end of time.”
The visual burned like a hot ember in my chest.
Fuck this man.
