It’s a bad habit I’ve picked up recently, spying on her. It started as curiosity but didn’t stay that way for long. Soon it was watching her in class. At the coffee shop with Louellen. Even her bedroom window at night. That’s how I know she doesn’t sleep much.
Instead, she paces.
On those nights, I stand outside in the dark and watch her cross the soft glow of her room, back and forth, slow and restless, like she’s trying to escape whatever follows her into the quiet.
I find myself wondering what keeps her awake.
Whether it looks anything like mine.
Add it to my list of sins. Ashford House enforcer, murderer, and now stalker.
Do I feel bad about it?
Fuck no. I always knew I wasn’t the good guy.
That part doesn’t bother me. What I don’t like is the unease that builds when I go too long without seeing her. It starts small, easy to ignore, then spreads, an itch under my skin until there’s only one way to get rid of it.
I need to know where she is. Who she’s with. To make sure she’s safe.
Because I’m not the only one paying attention.
I hear it some nights outside her room. A rustle in the bushes. The shift of a foot that’s not mine. When I go looking, there’s nothing there. But I can still guess whoit is.
Jackson.
Watching her the same way I do. I bet he can’t look away either.
He was there the night of her birthday. Did he notice it too? How easily she fit in with the sisters. You wouldn’t know she hadn’t always belonged there. She blended in, like a chameleon.
“Carrson.”
“Yeah?” I rest my hand on the gear shifter, inches from her leg.
“Go faster,” she breathes, her cheeks pink.
My eyebrows draw up. “You serious?”
“What?” She shrugs. “You scared?”
Did she just…challenge me?
The next curve is right ahead. I speed into it. The tires bite, digging into the asphalt with a squeal. The car lunges forward. The steering wheel jerks under my hands, fighting me, but I don’t let it win. I keep it steady. Force it through.
“That all you’ve got?” she yells over the roar of the engine.
“Let’s see how you like this.” I push the gas pedal down so hard it hits the floorboard. The car takes off like a shot, barreling down the narrow country road. It’s a good thing my house is secluded and that there’s no real traffic besides us. If I crash at this speed, there’s no way we’d walk away. That’s what makes my heart beat faster, accelerating along with the car.
Next to me, Becky laughs, giddy and reckless.
I take the next turn way too fast, the back end sliding across the road and jolting over the tall weeds and wildflowers that grow in the ditch.
Like before, Becky leans with it, into it, her body following the turn instead of resisting. My gaze slides to her chest rising, thighs pressing together. A small, unconscious tell that lets me know she’s not reacting to the danger. She’s enjoying it.
She wants the edge, and even more disconcerting is the realization that I might want to take her there.
I don’t slow until we reach the outskirts of my property, where the trees thin without warning. One moment it’s forest on either side of the road, dense, closing in, and the next it opens. The house sits at the end of a long stretch of gravel, set back far enough that it feels separate from everything around it.
White.
