CHAPTER TWELVE
Jack
The next morning I stood at the end of my driveway and waited, looking at my watch. It was still dark outside. Now that the season was crawling slowly towards fall, it was staying dark longer in the morning. And it was slightly cooler.
Slightly.
This wasn’t how I liked to jog. I was more than happy to do it in the comfort of my air-conditioned home gym, on my state-of-the-art treadmill, while watching an action movie on the huge TV I’d had installed.
But if this is how I could get to Daisy, so be it.
I waited until my watch hit five thirty on the nose, and I took off at a slow pace down the tree-lined sidewalk.
I had to admit it was pleasant, even if it was way earlier than I wanted to be doing something like this.
The wrought-iron fencing with ivy trailing over it, the gas lights flickering and lighting the path in front of me, and the Spanish moss drifting lazily in the breeze in the trees above me—it all provided a hell of a lot more atmosphere than my home gym.
Maybe I should think about switching up my routine permanently, not just for Daisy.
I laughed softly to myself. Switch up my routine. As if that was something I ever did. That’s why this whole ‘thing’ with Daisy was so odd. My need to see her outweighed my need for perfect order in my life. Wanting to be around her took the place of wanting to follow my normal daily schedule.
If I’d known falling in love—or whatever this was—would be what it took to shake me up a little, I might’ve tried it years ago.
But I knew way down deep that I hadn’t chosen to fall for Daisy.
It happened to me. It was nothing I could’ve predicted or prevented.
No, on some molecular level, my body and brain knew that I belonged to her.
And she belonged to me.
As I jogged by her house, I glanced over in an attempt to look casual. I knew she wouldn’t be there. I wanted to ‘run into her by chance’ further away from her house. That way she’d have to stop and talk to me.
Movement along the side of her house caught my eye. I frowned and slowed down. Was I seeing things? I thought I saw the figure of a man standing on the brick half-wall that bordered the tall hedges separating Daisy’s house from her neighbors’.
What the actual fuck?
I turned and jogged up her driveway, trying to be quiet.
The man seemed totally comfortable. It was as if he’d done this before and didn’t expect to be caught.
I stopped and hid behind a large, perfectly trimmed bush to watch him.
He was standing outside the window I thought was Daisy’s room.
I’d followed her home a couple of evenings and seen that light go on shortly after she entered the house.
He was staring inside. Watching. Waiting. He knew she wasn’t in there yet. I could tell by looking at his relaxed posture. He knew her routine as well as I did.
He and I both knew she was out for her morning run.
I had learned that Daisy was almost as strict with her daily schedule as I was. It made it easy to follow her, to learn her routines.
To stalk her.
I stood behind the bush, shocked. I wasn’t the only one stalking Daisy. My heart was pounding, and it wasn’t from the short jog to her house. Rage, fury like I’d never known washed over me.
How long had he been coming to her window? What all had he seen? Had he seen her naked? Did he know what lingerie touched her beautiful body? How dare he invade her privacy like that?
I mean, I was invading her privacy, too. But I’d had the decency—so far—not to peep into her actual living space. Her most private sanctuary.
I narrowed my eyes, trying to see his face, but I couldn’t make out any features. Even though the sky was lightening from inky black to a deep purple, it was still too dark to see him well. Was he dangerous? Did he have a weapon?
Or was he like me? Obsessed, but not a threat. I didn’t want to hurt her. I wanted to fuck her. I wanted to own that body. I wanted to make her mine. I wanted to keep her and never let her go. But I wouldn’t harm a hair on her head.
And I understood the word ‘no’. I didn’t want to hear it.
I refused to hear it yet. I knew she’d turned me down when I’d asked her out.
But there was something in her eyes, her stance, her demeanor towards me that screamed that she wanted to be with me, too.
She just thought I was a complete asshole and a liar.
Once she knew I wasn’t, then I thought we could work things out.
Ultimately, though, if she continued to turn me down, if she didn’t want to be with me, I’d have to find a way to deal with my feelings. I’d have to let her go.
I looked at the man standing in the shadows waiting for her to get home from her morning jog. Was he the same as I was? Or was he the kind of guy who ‘loved’ her so much he’d kill her to keep her from being with anyone else? There was something about him that left me with a cold feeling.
It was like the kind of feeling you get when you’re walking in the woods on a perfect day; the birds are singing, the squirrels are frolicking and running around, and then suddenly you realize everything has gone silent.
Even the cicadas. That’s when the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, and you get the hell out of the forest.
Humans might be highly evolved, but we’re still animals. We can sense when a predator is nearby. And that’s how this guy was making me feel, even though he was shorter than I was, thinner, less muscular. I got the strong sense that he would fight with a viciousness I’d never encountered before.
And that meant he would hurt Daisy.
I had to find out who he was. I moved out from behind the bush and creeped along the edge of the driveway, walking in the grass, mostly hidden by shrubbery.
He spoke suddenly, and his voice sent chills down my spine. He was whispering, obviously trying to cover up the true sound of his voice.
“I know you’re there.”
Oh. My. God. With any other man I would run at him and attack the asshole. This guy? He was… off. This guy wasn’t okay, and I could feel it. There was a palpable aura of evil around him.
I pulled my phone from my pocket with shaking hands. I knew the mayor. I knew the sheriff. I might as well use those contacts. But before I could call Sheriff Tate Richards, he spoke again.
“I’m watching you, too. I know you want her.
” He chuckled, then, under his breath. “You can’t have her,” he said as he stepped back into the shadows of the hedgerow behind him.
I heard his footsteps as he ran, and I started to chase him.
But I knew it would be fruitless. He had a massive head start. And he was fast.
But I’d heard him say one more thing as he ran away, and for some reason it scared me more than anything else. He’d said, ‘Get your own pretty girl,’ and the way he’d said it made me freeze in place.
My finger hovered over the sheriff’s personal contact information, but I stopped just before I made the call. The stalker was watching me, too. He knew I wanted Daisy. He knew I was following her. Just how much had he figured out about me?
Would he tell the police I was stalking her, too? Would the police even believe that I’d seen anyone? Or would they ask what I was doing looking so closely at Daisy’s home?
“Fuck,” I breathed as I realized something.
When I’d driven past this house with Tiffani Grace, I’d casually asked if it was for sale.
She had said no, and that Carmen Salazar owned this mansion.
All the women living here worked for her.
If I called the police and reported a stalker outside Daisy’s window, in a place a person just passing by on the sidewalk would be hard pressed to notice, wouldn’t they wonder what the hell I was doing out here?
I wondered if they’d had other men watching the house.
I mean, it was full of the most gorgeous women in West Bay.
Women who made a living at gentleman’s clubs.
Goddamn. I was a cliché. I could see the headlines now: ‘Nerdy video game designer caught peeping at Playboy-style mansion.’
It wouldn’t help that women actually wanted to date me. That I didn’t look nerdy on the outside. I sure as hell was on the inside.
Would it be a huge red flag to Daisy? She would know I was stalking her then.
Right? I rubbed my hand over my face before putting my hands on my hips.
What was I going to do? I sure as hell couldn’t let her stay here if some psycho was watching her.
And I had definitely picked up psycho serial killer vibes from that guy.
But how did I get her out of this house?
I took off jogging for real this time, feet hitting the pavement hard and fast. I wasn’t furiously trying to outrun the problem. No, I was thinking, trying to work out the best way to handle it. When I was anxious, which was often, I exercised. And this time was no different.
So, when a woman ran into me, and I had to catch her by the arms to keep her from falling, it was for real. It took me a moment to realize it was Daisy, sweating and breathing hard, who I was holding steady.
I almost laughed. I had planned to ‘run into her’ but it had happened for real.
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she gasped out.
My eyes fell to what she was wearing. It was simple, a tight jog bra that didn’t do much to strap in those luscious breasts of hers.
And the shortest athletic shorts I’d ever seen.
I had to bite the inside of my cheek to keep from staring at her ass.
Her small, tanned waist was covered in beads of sweat, and I wanted to lick them off.
Badly. But I had to rein myself in.
“Jack, what are you doing out here?”
“Running.” I blinked at her. I was still disoriented from seeing that other stalker at her house.
She put her hands on her hips and looked at me suspiciously. “Are you following me?”
“Me?” I pointed at myself. “No.” Wow. That was convincing, Jack.
She lifted an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything.
“How’ve you been?”
“Fine,” she said, looking around. “Look, I’ve got to go.”
She made a move to run, but I pulled her close to me.
“Oh, don’t touch me right now,” she protested, trying to pull away, “I’m all gross and sweaty from my run.” I held on tight.
“That doesn’t matter to me at all,” I assured her. “I just want to talk to you. I’ve missed you. You don’t deliver my lunch anymore.”
“No. I thought it would be easier if we didn’t see each other, you know?”
I nodded. “You know, Tallon quit seeing that woman. Meegan.”
“Okay. Why?”
“Because she lied about her friend and me. He thought if she’d lie about something like that then she’d lie about other things, too.”
She pulled back and studied my face. “I want to believe you, Jack. It’s just… well, I’ve had too much evidence to the contrary, I guess.”
“I’m going to figure out a way to make you see who I am now,” I said. “To show you how much I really want you.”
An alarm went off on her sports watch. “I’ve got to go. Sorry.” She almost seemed like she might even mean that. “Bye,” she called out, and I heard her feet rhythmically hitting the pavement a few seconds later.
“I’ll be in touch,” I called after her, not knowing if she heard me.
I jogged off in the opposite direction. I jogged a little way before turning around and going back on the other side of the road.
I had to make sure she made it home safely.
Now that I had seen that guy outside her house, I wasn’t going to sleep well at night until I had her safely beside me.
How long would it take to convince her to move in with me? Probably more than a week or two.
But I would do whatever it took. Because I wanted a relationship with Daisy. I knew I had to overcome her impression of me. But I wanted her.
And I was willing to do whatever it took to get her.
Even go back and finish my tour of Nico Salazar’s gentleman’s clubs.
I’d decided never to go back to those clubs since all I wanted was Daisy.
But if Daisy worked there? My mind was already working overtime.
I had to figure out where exactly she worked.
If that was the only way for me to be around her, then so be it. I would join Nico’s clubs.
I had a call to make as soon as I got to the office.
It was clear I’d be booking the rest of that tour with Nico Salazar sooner rather than… well, never.