“May I come in?” I asked and tried to copy his smile though I was sure it looked nowhere near as perfect as his.
He nodded and stepped aside, letting me in before closing the door again and fastening the security chain back on. I bit my lip.
“You…” I started but stopped.
If it made him feel safer what was the harm in letting him lock it?
He turned to me, and I shook my head.
“Are you feeling better?”
He smiled.
“I am, thank you,” he said, his voice half as spirited as it once was.
“Do…do you want to tell me what happened?” I asked.
Zach shrugged and walked to the couch. I followed him.
“Nothing. I’m good,” he said.
“What do you mean nothing happened? Your truck is gone,” I said, staring at the man.
“Oh. That. Yeah. The…the truck is gone.”
He sounded absent-minded, staring at a spot on the wall opposite me as if facing me was the hardest thing he had to do. But I could tell there was more to the story. I could tell this had nothing to do with me and everything to do with this…bastard ex of his.
“Why would your ex do that to you?” I asked. I needed to get to the bottom of this somehow.
“Oh, ah…because he hates me. I…I dumped him and he…he didn’t take it well.”
He gave me a fleeting glance before he returned his attention to that damned spot on the wall.
“That’s the understatement of the century,” I said.
He sighed.
“I don’t know what to tell you,” he said, looking at me.
“How about the truth?” I said with as much control and patience as I could muster.
Zach licked his lips and his eyelids drooped heavily over his eyes, making me want to reach out for him. To pull him back into my arms. To secure him there like I’d done minutes ago when he fainted. I would have held him forever if I could. The smell of his body still lingered on me like a perfume I never wanted to get rid of.
“It…it took a lot for me to leave him. Victor…he’s obsessed with me. I couldn’t just find another place to live, I had to disappear, to go as far away as possible from him to find my peace. Obviously, I didn’t go far enough.”
My muscles tensed just hearing the defeat in his voice, seeing it in his expression and in the way he barely held himself together.
“So that man is dangerous,” I stated.
Zach opened his mouth as if to disagree and I interjected.
“He just burned down your truck. There’s no question he’s dangerous. And now he knows where you live.”
Zach nodded.
“Well, I for one don’t want to find out what happens if he gets closer to you than he already has.”
“That’s why I need to go,” he said.
