Always Watching (Always #1)

1. Ranen

Chapter 1

Ranen

A uthorities are still seeking tips for a missing Red Hill man, Austin Rogers. Rogers went missing after his shift at a local grocery store, Super Foods Plus, and hasn’t been seen since. He was last spotted on CCTV exiting the store, but it lost sight of him as he walked toward his vehicle. Rogers is five-nine, approximately one hundred and seventy pounds. He has brown hair, light-brown eyes, and a tattoo across his throat of a stitched neck wound. If you have any information, please contact Crime Stoppers. There is a five-thousand dollar reward for information on his whereabouts.

I turn the radio off, blowing out a nervous breath. I guess it’s a good thing I didn’t hear that news report until after I returned to my car from grocery shopping at Super Foods Plus.

As I’m driving back home, I rack my brain for any memory of Austin Rogers. I usually shop earlier in the day, so he was probably a night-shift employee. I’m sure I’d remember a tattoo like that if I saw it.

A shiver runs down my spine as I turn into my apartment complex. Red Hill has never been a place where people just disappear, but this isn’t the first missing person in the past few months. True, it’s not the safest town in America, but there isn’t rampant crime either. A murder once every few years, petty thefts, stuff like that, but never missing people .

Every time I hear a description on the news, they’re a different race, height, hair, and eye color. I’ve read a few books about victimology and how most killers have the same type of people they like to… eliminate. Whoever is snatching all these people doesn’t have a type, though. So that leads me to believe they’re either not picky kidnappers or there’s more than one person active. That scares me even more.

I put my car in park and blow out another long breath, mainly because now I have to carry everything upstairs to the second floor. I always tell myself I’m going to order my groceries next time so I don’t have to climb all those stairs, but I’d feel guilty if I asked someone else to do it, even if I paid them.

I get out of my car and walk to the trunk, already irritated by the trip upstairs and I haven’t even taken it yet. Like most people, I grab every single bag on one trip so I don’t have to make the climb more than once, and since I waited until the last minute to shop this time, I have a fuck ton of bags.

A sound of frustration at myself leaves my lips as I trudge to my apartment building and start up the stairs. Just as I’m going up, my landlord is coming down. I fight to keep the scowl from my face, especially since he keeps coming down the stairs as if he doesn’t see my arms full of bags.

He smiles creepily at me and I fight to suppress a shudder. My landlord is disgusting, always commenting on my body and giving me lustful, dirty looks that make me want to take a shower and scrub my skin off. He’s much taller than my five-five height, probably closer to six feet. He has a nice dad bod that would be hot on anyone else, but everything about him disgusts me, so I don’t look at him in any sexual way. His blond hair is thinning, always in a messy bun on top of his head. When his eyes roam over me, my stomach roils with unease. Something is off about him.

I’m almost one hundred percent sure he’s subscribed to my cam channel, which only ratchets up the creep factor. He probably thinks that because he pays to watch me jerk off and play with my ass I owe him something.

I’ve been camming for the past three years—since I turned twenty—and I love it. It’s an easy way to make money and I love showing off my body, even if I’ve never done much more than what I do on cam.

Well, nothing at all more than what I’ve done on cam. Virgin, party of me.

What I don’t love about my job is not being able to know who my subs are, even though they’ve seen my face plenty of times and if they live in Red Hill could pick me out of a crowd.

Like my landlord, Mr. Barlowe.

He stands directly in front of me, blocking my path while I have two arms loaded down with groceries. I don’t like him being on the step higher than me. I have to look up at him and I hate that feeling.

“Ranen. What are you up to?”

I look down at my bags in an exaggerated way, hoping he takes the hint and gets the fuck out of my way. “Just getting in from shopping, Mr. Barlowe.”

He laughs, waving me away. “Now, I told you to call me Todd. All my friends call me Todd.”

“Mr. Barlowe,” I say with emphasis. “If you’ll excuse me.”

He steps in my way and I sigh heavily, my arms aching, but I won’t give him the satisfaction of showing my discomfort. “Did you hear about that missing guy?” He points to my shopping bags. “I know you visit Super Foods Plus a lot.”

That would be creepy if it weren’t one of the only grocery stores in Red Hill besides Walmart. There aren’t many options.

“Yeah, I heard. What of it?”

“I want you to be safe,” he says, lifting his hand and dragging a finger down my face. My hands are full, making it impossible for me to slap his hand away. He has me trapped and he knows it. “I can protect you. Why don’t you… stay with me for a few days? At least until they catch this maniac.”

“Stop touching me,” I say through clenched teeth. I rarely get angry or even have an attitude with anyone, but he’s invading my personal space, and fight or flight is real. “You’re making me uncomfortable.”

Mr. Barlowe chuckles and moves to the side so I can ease past him. “Don’t mean to do that. Think about what I said, Ranen. I can protect you.”

I ignore him as I hurry up the stairs to my apartment, my arms feeling as if they’re about to fall off. A disgruntled noise slips past my lips as I see a package at my door. It’s not overly large, but it’s also in my way when I just want to get inside.

Last year, Mr. Barlowe sprung for these electric keypads on our doors. At first I hated it, thinking that if the power went out, we couldn’t get inside. But not only does it have a key slot for that very reason, it also makes it easier to get inside when my hands are full of groceries.

With effort, I lift my right hand and input the code, and the door pops open. I kick the package inside as I waddle over the threshold, grateful to be home. As soon as the door closes behind me, I set my many bags down, shaking my arms out and trying to get the blood flowing through them again. My wrists and arms are red where the straps of the bags dug into them. With my fair skin, the marks stand out in sharp relief.

Fuck, it sucks that I bruise so easily. My subs will notice, for sure. If I thought it would affect my money, I’d cancel the show tonight, but most subs will ask if I’m okay and after I tell them why I’m all bruised, they’ll drop it. They don’t really care about my life. They care about me stroking my cock or playing with my ass until I come.

After getting some of the feeling back in my arms, I put away my groceries—which takes me the better part of twenty minutes since I take the time to throw out leftovers and clean my dishes, as well as organize my shelves.

A light film of sweat coats my body when I’m finished. It’s just as well. I need to get showered and changed into more comfortable clothes anyway, since my session starts in less than an hour.

My shower takes time, as I have to get myself clean and groomed everywhere. I’m not sure what my paid viewers will vote for tonight, so I want to be ready for anything.

I’m drying my hair with a towel when my eyes snag on the box I kicked in earlier. A frown turns down my lips. I don’t remember ordering anything recently.

I pick the box up, only to find it doesn’t have a shipping label on it, which means it’s not one of my subs sending me a toy from my wish list they’d like to see me use.

Every true crime program I’ve ever watched would caution me against opening this box. My recent experiences with someone leaving letters at my door would caution the same thing. But it could also be something Mr. Barlowe dropped off. He was coming from the second floor when I was coming up. There are only four units on this landing, so it’s a reasonable explanation.

Shrugging, I toss my towel onto one of the chairs at my dining table and pick up the box. It’s light, so I don’t think it’s a bomb. Duh, it’s not a bomb. I’m sure if it were, when I’d kicked it as hard as I had, it would have blown me to bits.

Since I figure I’m safe on that front, I grab a knife and cut through the tape. I expect more craziness from the unknown person who’s been leaving unsettling letters at my door, but no. It’s nothing like that. Or at least, I don’t think so. This gift is sweet, not threatening or creepy like the others I’ve received.

It’s a wheat-brown Build-A-Bear, equipped with a blue sweater that has my name on it. It can’t be a coincidence or mistake; there aren’t many people with the name Ranen. Is this something Mr. Barlowe dropped off to woo me or some shit? He’s old enough to be my dad, but he has his eyes set on me. Fucking creeper.

The bear is adorable, though.

I press the button on its paw to hear whatever song someone thought to include. Fear and dread skitter down my spine as I listen to the haunting melody of Tiny Tim’s “Tiptoe Through the Tulips.” For some reason, this song conjures up negative feelings of fear and anxiety that has my heart rate kicking up. I want this bear as far away from me as possible.

Still feeling uneasy, I stuff it back in the box and toss it across the room. Thankfully, the song doesn’t start up again.

My heart is thundering against my rib cage, and my hands are shaking. Who’s sending me all this creepy shit?

First, it was emails. They started off harmless enough, just saying they saw me and thought I was handsome and wanted to get to know me better—I figured it was a subscriber, since my email is public on my site—but then things got scarier when I didn’t answer them. Letters started showing up, stuffed in my door. The old-school stalker kind, with haphazard letters cut out of magazines and put together in a macabre sort of correspondence.

I had a camera mounted over my door to catch the culprit, but I live around college students who come and go, and I lost a lot of sleep with the constant alerts from the camera to my phone. So I took it down. I asked one of my closest friends and fellow cammers, Olly, for advice and help, but he didn’t know what to do either. He offered to spend a few nights with me to keep an eye on things, but that didn’t help—the day after he spent the night, we woke up to a letter stuffed in my door.

Whoever is doing this shit hasn’t tried to harm me, but that doesn’t mean they won’t. So I recently started taking self-defense classes and applied for a gun permit.

This is the first time in months they’ve made me afraid of being in my own home. I look around, thinking every dark corner has something lurking in it.

I nearly jump out of my skin when the alarm goes off—time for me to start my show. A nervous chuckle escapes as I run my hand over my forehead. I’m overreacting. Going from zero to one hundred because of a teddy bear. That’s the most harmless thing my stalker could have sent. Why am I freaking out?

“Give it a rest,” I mutter to myself, walking to my room so I can get dressed.

No matter what I tell myself, I’m still shaken up by the teddy bear. I’m not sure if it’s Mr. Barlowe or someone else, but I plan to ask him about it tomorrow. I’m not sure I’ll know if he’s telling the truth, but if he knows I’m onto his shit, he might chill out and stop making me feel unsafe—if it is him.

My hands are still shaking when I get my stream started. I try to push it down, but I’m fucking frightened. I tell myself to stop freaking out over a teddy bear, but it’s more than that… it’s that fucking song; so haunting and scary, eliciting a visceral response from me I wasn’t expecting.

Several pings pop up on my chat screen and I shake myself out of my thoughts.

derbycockrider69: u ok, Cas?

Cassidy Star is my cam name, but it takes me a moment to realize Derby is talking to me.

“I’m good, Derby. Thanks for asking,” I say in a tone that’s supposed to come out breathy, but sounds unsure. “I’m good.” More people join the stream and I greet them as they pop up. “I’m glad you could all join me. For those of you who weren’t around last week, we used a fleshlight. What are we in the mood for today? I have the options and a poll up for you to vote. You can purchase tokens to vote on my site, and I’ll close the voting in five minutes.”

camfan09: can we get a show while we wait?

teninchmonster: yeah. show your ass

kodachrome99: can we still watch if we don’t vote?

I look over the chats and smile, though it feels forced. “Yes, Cam, you can have a show while you wait. Sorry, Ten Inch, my ass is not a part of the show yet. Koda, you can watch since you paid to see the live feed. Don’t be disappointed if the show isn’t what you want to see, though.”

A few more messages roll in and I start to feel more and more like myself, the last dregs of unease falling from my shoulders.

While I wait for the timer to go off and end the voting, I palm my dick, stroking it slowly. I get an influx of tips, and comments begging me to pull my length out and jerk off, but I don’t immediately. I want to build the anticipation for the main event. When the countdown reads two and a half minutes, I reach into my tight shorts and free my erection, a drop of precum leaking from the head.

“See what you all do to me?” I whisper to the camera in a sultry voice. “I can’t wait to see what you vote for. Hopefully it’s something for my ass tonight.” I jerk myself slowly, not wanting to get close to the edge just yet—I want to give a good show.

The timer goes off and I smile. “Alright, the votes are in. Let’s see what we got.”

Just as I lean forward to read the results, a private message pops up.

DID YOU GET MY BEAR???

My breathing stutters and sweat breaks out over my body. Whoever the person is has never sent me a private message. I quickly check the screen name, and almost swallow my tongue: ICURan.

They made a username specifically for me.

I quickly close the private message and try to concentrate on the subscribers who are sending me comments in the chat, but I can’t focus. Something about today feels different. Maybe it was hearing about the man who was kidnapped from his job—a store I visit often. Maybe it was Mr. Barlowe’s unwanted touch, or maybe it was the bear. Hell, maybe it’s a combination of all those things, but I can’t be here. These four walls can’t surround me right now.

I have to go.

Pushing my hair back from my forehead, I tell my viewers in a voice shaking with terror, “I gotta go. I’m sorry.”

I quickly disconnect the live stream and hop off my bed, then I rush to my closet for my go bag—a bag I packed for this very reason—and shoulder it. I have clothes in my car I can change into, but right now I have to get out of here.

After grabbing my car keys and my phone, I power walk to the door and slide my shoes on before I flee my home

Once I’m safely in my car, I search for my emergency clothes in the back seat while simultaneously pulling up my text thread. I find Olly’s name and shoot him a quick message.

Me: Hey, I know you might be in a session, but I’m coming over. I’ll be quiet. But I can’t be home right now.

I have a key to his house, so it’ll be no big deal for me to go in and lounge while he’s working.

Surprisingly, he answers back.

Olly: You have near-perfect timing. I just shot my load and logged off. What’s up?

Instead of answering him, I toss my phone into the passenger seat and point my car toward his house. I’ll talk to him when I arrive. Right now, I need to put some distance between me and my apartment.