Doom
Six years ago…
ISMILED AS Aspen Westwood opened the door to her townhouse and shook her head. “I told you not to come.”
“And I told you I didn’t give a shit.”
She rolled her eyes, stepping back and waving me inside. She looked adorable in sweats and an oversized T-shirt, her hair pulled up in a messy bun on top of her head. She’d taken her normal brunette hair and gone more of a magenta and she looked cute as hell.
I’d met Aspen a couple of years ago when I’d helped my buddy, Dalton, with a babysitting job. Aspen had been the job, and she and I had hit it off. Well, we’d hit it off as much as gunpowder and matches hit it off. We fucked hard, and fought harder.
“Doom,” she said with a sigh. “I need you to hear me. Really hear me.”
“I listen better when I’m naked.”
She let out a frustrated squeak and dragged her hands down her face.
“Okay, Aspen,” I said. “I’m listening.”
“This,” she waved her hand between us, “is not going to happen.”
“It al—”
“Again,” she clarified.
“But it’s good.”
“The sex is, yes, but you’re not available.”
“Sweetheart, I’m right here.”
She gave me a sad smile. “But you’re not and you know it. You’re angry. Angrier, if that’s even possible. I care about you, and I know you care about me, but we don’t love each other, and Iknowsomeone is out there for me, for both of us, who will.”
I forced down the rage that threatened to prove her point. “There won’t ever—”
“I know.” She stroked my face and I reared back like she’d struck me. She dropped her hand and blinked back tears. “Sorry.”
“Whatever,” I ground out. “I’ll leave you alone.”
“Stop,” she demanded as I turned to leave. “You need to get a handle on this, Doom, or you’ll rot from the inside. Talk to someone.”
What she didn’t understand was that my insides had already festered well past the rot stage and no amount of talking would change that.
“Call me if you wanna fuck, Aspen. See you around.”
I walked out her door, climbed on my bike, and rode away.
* * *
Present Day…
I rolled out from under the Lexus I was working on and stood. I’d found the source of the leak and headed toward the parts room just as the sound of screeching tires and crunching metal had me rushing out the front door of the shop.
Alamo and Rabbit were right behind me and we saw a beat up Ford F-150 next to a little Passat in the ditch by the road. The Passat was currently upside down, so we ran for the wreckage.
“Oh my god, that truck rammed into that little car,” a woman in a Honda explained as she got out of her car. “He’s been following her for several blocks.”
“Call 9-1-1,” Alamo directed, and he and I focused on the Passat while Rabbit headed to the truck.
