Oh. I probably should have answered that call before opening the door.
“Okay, well. Let's go,” I chirp, breezing past him to grab my stuff off the table. My eyes go to the closet, wondering how the fuck I’m going to get Theodore out of here without my father noticing.
“This is beautiful,” my dad says, gazing at the rough outline of my painting. I thank him kindly, knowing that my first layout looks like shit, but he falls in love with all my work, even the crappy ones.
“What’s it going to be?”
“I’m calling it Decaying Devotion.” A symbol of a love that is destined to fail. “It’s a counter to one I’m creating in my painting class. I’m hoping to submit them as a pair.”
He straightens his spine with delight, nodding his head. “Well, I can’t wait to see it finished.”
Pulling me into a hug, he kisses me on the crown of the head, mumbling how proud he is to have me as a daughter.
I feel a tiny bit guilty, letting him profess his pride for his only daughter when I have a grown man hiding in my closet. How would he feel then? Would he look at me differently if he knew the things I wanted to do to Mr. Ellis? Or the things I wanted him to do to me…
I hope to never find out.
“Where’s the bathroom, sweetie?”
Pointing him toward the door at the end of the small hallway, I hold my breath, waiting until I hear the vent fan kick on before rushing to the closet.
“What the fuck, Scarlett?!” Theodore hisses as I yank him out. We keep our steps light on the concrete floor, or maybe I just can’t hear them over the pounding in my chest.
I listen to the water flowing from the bathroom sink, picking up the pace to the front door. I practically throw him out, shoving him into the far wall as fast as I can. Before he can leave, I throw myself into his arms for one last kiss. “My mom is waiting in the front. Don’t let her see you. There’s an emergency exit right across the hall. Go through there!” Those are my final words before I slam the door in his face.
The latch clicks shut just as my father emerges. “I must say, Scarlett, this loft is impressive. Although, I don’t see how you could have afforded it with your savings.”
“Maybe I saved more than you were aware of,” I retort, shutting down the lights so he can’t see the flush rising to my chest.
After locking up, we take a tour through the hallways. My father claims he lost his way, but I know it’s because he’s gauging how dangerous it could be for me on my own. Fortunately, the corridors are brightly lit and monitored with motion-activated cameras. It’s safe.
Well, a majority of the space is safe. I fail to mention that the path to my loft has no working cameras.
As we step outside, the fresh air does a good job of cooling down the fire in my chest. From across the parking lot, I see a man jogging in the moonlight. He looks no different than any shadowed figure, but if you look just right, you can see the bits of gold shimmering under the lamplight, at least until his wedding ring catches the beam.
Again, I should be mortified by my actions, my thoughts. But I’m not. In fact, I feel the exact opposite. Whoever his wife is, he doesn’t belong to her. I think he’s made it very clear who owns his mind.
Soon, I’ll own his body.
And what’s a soul but something to possess as well.
Sunday passed by in a blur.
Those are our lazy days. It’s the one day a week where we can do absolutely nothing. My father usually never partakes in this custom, but he recently found the missing teenage girl they’ve been searching for. She ran away in the middle of the night to live with her father. Apparently, her mother had been beating her daily, refusing to feed her while also making her work endlessly in the basement of their home. For what, I’m not too sure, my father wouldn’t say. But whatever it was had him calling off today.
Because Sundays are for relaxation, we do nothing but sleep or catch up on whatever television we missed, which makes the day fly by faster than all the others.
My adrenalin has been nonstop since the beginning of the week, and I took the opportunity, along with my parents, to finally crash, sleeping from ten last night to almost six this evening.
By the time we woke up and headed downstairs, the sun was already setting. My dad and I decided to give Mom a break from making dinner, and together, we whipped up her favorite dish, chicken and shrimp paella.
After eating and cleaning up the mess, I left them to have some alone time, and finished up the homework I had put off until the end. Then, sometime before eleven at night, I got a text from my favorite secret.
I’ll be in my office early tomorrow morning. If you still need some tutoring.
Tutoring. I wonder if that’ll be our code for whatever it is we’ve started. He’stutoringme with his hand on my ass and fingers around my neck.
I couldn’t wait to wake up after that, so quickly, I finished all my work and went right back to sleep.
