Chapter Eleven
Brynn
I don’t know what time it is.
The room is dark, but the curtains are the type to block out light. Still, I can see it’s dark outside.
Killian fell asleep, and I almost did, too, but since I have to be up early in the morning, I asked if he could set an alarm for me since I don’t have my phone.
He mumbled something dismissive and rolled over. He didn’t set an alarm.
Then I couldn’t fall asleep because I wasn’t sure what to do. I needed him to wake up and set his alarm. I considered grabbing his phone and trying to do it myself, but he likely has a passcode.
Then I started thinking about my phone.
The fact that I turned my passcode off before I went to the party. I tried to ignore Stacie’s warnings about her bad feelings, but then I thought about how dumb I would feel if she was right. Even though I didn’t think she was, I decided to unlock my phone just in case I needed to get into it quickly.
A decision I am obviously regretting now.
My purse is in that basement, and while I don’t think the wealthy frat guys have any need to rob me, there is all kinds of private information in that phone.
I don’t just need an alarm set; I need to get home.
Killian is still fast asleep beside me, and his back is to me now.
I move slowly and carefully, keeping my eyes on him as I climb off the bed. Seeing he’s still asleep, I walk as gently as I can back to his closet. The door is still open since he distracted me while I was in there, and my heart pounds like I’m a criminal mid-heist when I snatch the T-shirt I dropped on the floor and carefully remove it from its hanger. I put the hanger back, cringing at the noise, which seems amplified given how hard I’m trying to be quiet. I pull his shirt over my head, surprised it still manages to smell like him since it also smells of laundry detergent.
I hate to go through any of his other things, but I also cannot leave this apartment in just his T-shirt. I eye up his dresser and pull open the bottom drawer, hoping I picked the right one.
I breathe a big sigh of relief when I find his workout clothes. I grab a pair of black and white basketball shorts and pull them on, then I sneak back into the bedroom to make sure he’s still asleep. I tiptoe into his bathroom and grab my tarnished costume off the sink where I left it after my shower, then I creep back through his bedroom. Luckily, the door is slightly ajar since we never closed that one, either.
Personally, sleeping in a bedroom with an open door makes me feel like we’re just sending embossed invitations to the serial killers who surely live in the shadows. RSVP! Don’t miss cocktail hour!
I shake my head, debating closing the door behind me to save him from the shadow murderers, but I don’t want to risk waking him up, so I’ll just have to send my thoughts and prayers that he stays alive.
I do feel bad about this next part, but honestly, he hasn’t left me much choice. I expressed to him my desire to leave, then I was willing to compromise and stay, but I needed him to set an alarm for me so I could make sure I got out of here when I needed to. I have a cat to feed, a phone to find, and I have to be up no later than five to get ready for work.
I’m grateful to him for his help, but I have responsibilities.
So I snatch his car key and pad over to the apartment door.
I hesitate when I get to it, though.
Leaving alone in the middle of the night doesn’t feel safe, but I remind myself I only have to get down to the parking garage, and then I’m in a locked car.
I have to leave. I know if I don’t, he’ll sidetrack me. I already let him wreck my plans to go to the police tonight, and I’m not sure that was the right decision, but I absolutely cannot let him claim the rest of my weekend.
I lost a lot of sleep thinking about waking up next to him, too. It felt a little greedy to let him pleasure me but not return the favor, and to be honest, he doesn’t seem like a charitable man.
My imagination allowed that he was probably tired after the night we’d had and that’s why he fell asleep, but come morning when he was rested, he might have some ideas about repayment.
And I’m not sure if that scared me more or less than the possible shadow murderers he was inviting to massacre us with that open bedroom door, but the fact was, they were on close enough levels to be compared.
I wasn’t sleeping anyway, so I need to be doing something.
So I am.
Escaping.
And… stealing a car, but if tonight has taught me anything about him, it’s that Killian Walsh is not a man who is ever going to call the police. Or maybe a doctor unless he’s dying, and even then, I’m not sure.
I won’t get in trouble, he’ll get his car back, and I’ll get home. Everyone wins.
With that thought in mind, I steel my nerves, open the door, and step out into the hallway. I don’t want to linger out here alone, so I make a beeline for the elevator. I press the button and look around like a paranoid lunatic while I wait for it, and fear grips me when I hear the ding. Illogically, I picture the doors opening and Kyle and his cronies waiting inside, but of course when the doors open, the elevator is empty.
I step inside and quickly press the button to close the doors.
When Killian brought me up in this thing, I thought it was creepy, but now the harsh fluorescent lighting and the creaking of the cables as the elevator descends make my stomach pitch.
Then it stops and the doors open.
A chill of unease ripples down my spine, but I ignore it and all the terrifying, empty space in the parking garage as I speed walk to Killian’s car. I press the button to unlock it four or five times and only give in to the paranoid impulse to look around a second before I rip the door open.
I throw myself inside, then yank the door closed and immediately hit the locks. I feel like I should breathe a little easier, but before I can, I check the car and the harshly lit space all around.
Nobody is here, Brynn. Settle down.
All I want is to get back to my apartment. Back to my life, really, before any of this shit happened tonight. I want a time machine to take me back a few hours to when I was putting on mascara, thinking smudges were the biggest threat I’d have to face tonight, and Stacie was begging me not to go. If I had it to do over again, I’d listen to her. I’d stay home and watch a stupid scary movie with Toast curled around my neck like a travel pillow.
My heart squeezes and all I want to do is go home and hug my cat.
Gotta start the car for that.
I give myself a reassuring nod and take a deep breath so I can let it out. The sooner I get out of here, the better.
I check the rearview mirror, half-afraid I’ll see Killian standing there, wanting to know what the hell I’m doing. But thankfully, I see no one, so I fire up the engine.
I feel slightly calmer once I’m out of the parking garage, but a new chapter of terror hits me when I see headlights in the rearview, someone riding my ass when there’s no one on the road.
Oh no.
What if it’s them? What if they’ve been lying in wait like hunters in a blind, and I’ve grand-theft-autoed myself right between their crosshairs?
Have I made a huge mistake?
My heart pounds and my palms feel sweaty. I can’t even call for help because I don’t have a phone. I’m not far from Killian’s, but I can’t turn around now. He’s asleep in his apartment and if they are following me, they’ll just continue to follow me into the parking garage and get me alone.
Crap.
On impulse, I hit my turn signal and tap the brake so I can turn right on whatever road this is.
I watch my rearview mirror and can finally breathe again when the car doesn’t turn with me.
Phew.
Now I just have to figure out where the hell I am.
It takes a bit of driving around and taking random turns in the logical directions, but eventually I find an area that’s familiar to me.
It’s near sorority row. I recognize the bakery on the corner where I fantasized about spending lazy Saturday afternoons sipping French roast and enjoying one of their delicious chocolate chip muffins while I worked on a paper.
That was if I got into one of the sororities I wanted to rush, but I didn’t.
Part of me wanted to make it for the experience and the connections, and the other half desperately wanted to get in since it would be cheaper to live in a shared bedroom at the sorority house than to split an apartment with a roommate.
Unfortunately, they were looking more for a stylish “scientist Barbie” than an actual aspiring molecular biologist.
Don’t get me wrong, I like cute clothes and garden parties, and I’d wear the hell out of those pastel dresses they seemed to like, but I think there was a disconnect in the images we project. The sorority sister who got roped into talking to me for more than a smile and a hello at the top house didn’t say so, but I’m pretty sure I was disqualified based on my social media presence alone.
That’s okay, it all worked out.
I do miss my fantasy Saturdays, though. I’m convinced they would have been great.
Thinking about that gets my mind off the frat guys who may want to murder me, and before I know it, I’m approaching my apartment building.
I’m getting really tired now that I’m this close to my own bed, too.
All that’s happened tonight flashes to mind like the first scene on a highlight reel, but I don’t have the capacity to process all of it, so I don’t try.
My building doesn’t have a parking garage, just a lot with too few spots for all the people that live here. As late as it is, there aren’t any left, and I feel guilty when I have to drive back around and park on the street. Killian has a nice car and I’ll feel terrible if anything happens to it.
Just as I turn the car off and reach for my costume in the passenger seat, I notice movement in the rearview mirror.
My eyes widen and my heart stops. There isn’t time to panic, though. The man saunters right around the car and stops by the driver’s side door.
I swallow, looking up at him, dread coursing through my entire body as his cool, blue-eyed gaze meets mine.
“Nice car,” he says, his voice dry enough that I can tell he knows it’s not mine.
But does he know that because he’s a friend of Killian’s who knows what his car looks like, or because he’s a Rho Kappa who saw me in it with Killian earlier?
“You must be the virgin sacrifice.”
Well, that’s just embarrassing.
Doesn’t clear up which brand of asshole he is, either.
I’m not sure why I’m so certain since I didn’t see all their faces, but I don’t believe he’s one of the guys in hoods I encountered at the frat house. There’s something about him—an ease, a cockiness. Something that seems to sort him into a category I’m assigning to Killian’s friends.
Not that I’ve met many of them, but I met Killian and his masked accomplice, and if this guy’s a third one… I’m confident in my swift judgment of the set of them.
Plus, there was something decidedly different about Kyle’s gang. They were the ones trying to pull off a murder plot, but they didn’t feel quite capable of it.
The guy standing on the other side of the door does. In fact, I have a hunch if he wanted me out of the car, I’d already be out of it, and that alone seems to settle my nerves.
“Are you…?” I hesitate, unsure what to say.
“A friend of the guy whose car you stole? Yes.”
My shoulders relax ever so slightly. He could be lying, but I believe him.
So I grab my costume and push open the door. He takes a step back to make room for me as I climb out, and my gaze drifts to what he’s wearing.
He’s dressed neatly in a pair of dark-colored slacks and a pale blue button-down with a nice leather belt and matching loafers. The top couple of buttons are undone and his shirt has a pocket with a pair of glasses hanging off it. I try to picture him in any glasses and can’t quite envision it, but especially these. They don’t look like they would suit him at all.
“Those don’t do much good on your shirt, you know.”
He cocks an eyebrow, then glances down at his pocket as if he’d forgotten all about them. “I don’t need glasses. They were part of my costume.”
“Oh yeah? Can I see?”
“No,” he says dryly.
I shoot him an annoyed look, but he doesn’t seem to mind. “I thought maybe it would help me recognize your costume. Presently, you just look like a wealthy douche.”
He cracks a smile, his blue eyes twinkling with faint amusement. “You’re impertinent for a car thief who almost died tonight because she hasn’t had the good sense to spread her legs.”
That zaps some of the satisfaction I was just feeling, so I narrow my eyes at him. “It’s rude to taunt people over their trauma before a full twelve hours has passed, you know.”
“I’m a wealthy douche, remember? It’s time when I say it’s time.”
I roll my eyes at him and hand over Killian’s car key. “I assume you’ll see him before I do, so see that this gets back to Killian, hm?”
He shakes his head as if disappointed in me. “You’re doing this all wrong. You’re supposed to keep the car. Is this your first night as a felon?”
“It’s my first night as a lot of things,” I mutter before heading for the entrance to my building.
Strangely, I feel better knowing he’s there.
The guy’s a jerk, but at least if he’s one of Killian’s friends, I know he’s not here to murder me—and I know he’s probably here to make sure no one else does, either.
My nerves finally settle when I get inside the apartment and lock the door.
The place is dark and I’m relieved Stacie didn’t wait up for me. I grab a cold bottle of water out of the fridge and pad down the hall to my bedroom. The door is cracked open, and when I turn on the light, I see my kitty curled up at the foot of my bed.
Sighing happily, I climb onto the bed so I can cuddle up with her. “I’m so happy to see you.”
She shifts her body, stretching along mine so she can cuddle close.
I close my eyes and just give myself a moment to feel normal again.
I know there are things I need to do. I need to grab my iPad so I can find and lock my phone, I need to change out of Killian’s clothes, I need to plug the iPad in so I can use that alarm since I don’t have a phone tonight.
But right now, I just need to listen to the contented sound of my cat purring, curled up against my body.
If Kyle and his idiot friends had had their way tonight, I never would have been able to do this again.
Even though I know she can’t understand me, I tell Toast, “If I ever don’t come home one night, I hope you know it’s because I physically can’t. I would never abandon you by choice.”
She looks up at me as I give her the little head rubs she likes and I smile at her.
Eventually, I get up.
I use the app to find my phone and see it’s still at the frat house. It would be nice if that meant no one had found it somehow, but I doubt I’m that lucky. I mark it as lost and lock it anyway. The next screen asks me to enter a message that should show up on my screen, so I type, “If found, please turn in to campus lost and found.”
I don’t expect any of the jerks that were in the basement to do it, but who knows? It would be nice because I certainly can’t afford to buy a new fucking phone. Maybe they’ll just want this trace of me out of their house and they’re smart enough not to toss my things in a trash can.
But probably not. I should probably check their trash can.
Not tonight.
Tonight, I need to get some sleep.
___
When my eyes open, the light is hitting me at an unnatural and unpleasant angle. Why is it so bright?
I shift and realize my body aches. Then I realize I fell asleep with Toast and never made it to my comfy pillow, so my neck was bent at a terrible angle, and… ouch.
Bleary-eyed, I try to orient myself. My iPad is lying open on the bed in front of me so I touch the screen.
I gasp with horror when I see 7:48 at the top of the screen. “No!”
I forgot to set the alarm.
I launch off the bed and rip open my bedroom door, hurrying out to the living area. Stacie is sitting on the gray futon couch, Toast curled up on the empty cushion beside her.
“Good morning, sleepyhead.”
“Can I use your phone?”
She starts to nod, but then her eyes widen and her jaw drops open as her gaze travels over what I’m wearing. “Are you… wearing a guy’s T-shirt?”
“It’s a long story.” I reach out a hand pleadingly. “I’m late for work, and I don’t have my phone.”
A frown flickers across her face and she holds out her phone for me to take. “What happened last night? Did you… I mean, I take it your ‘date’ with Kyle went well?”
“No. Kyle’s a douche. You were right. It’s someone else’s shirt.” I tap the internet browser on her phone so I can look up the restaurant’s phone number. “I am helpless without my phone. I need to do a detox or something and learn a couple of phone numbers.” I don’t wait for her to respond and put the ringing phone to my ear.
Stacie sits forward and hits pause on the TV, then she watches me on my call.
“Hi!” I say too enthusiastically when Donna answers the phone. “It’s Brynn. I’m so sorry. I lost my phone last night and—please don’t fire me.”
“Girl, we are swamped. If you get your ass here in the next half hour, you can keep your job, but you’d better hurry.”
Relieved that I still have a chance, I get off the phone fast and grab Toast’s food bowl so I can feed her before I leave.
“Um, I’m gonna need context for this morning-after look you’ve got going on,” Stacie says, leaning her hip against the small stretch of open counter and gesturing to my attire.
“I honestly don’t have time to explain.” I use the spoon to scrape the bottom of the tin, then tap it on the side to shake every last drop into the food dish. “Last night was a nightmare. Did a guy show up here…” I stop, unsure how to ask if Killian’s friend checked in on her like he said they would last night.
Stacie’s eyebrows rise. “Did Yacht Party Ken show up this morning and give me your car keys? Yes, he did. I know your instincts aren’t top tier, but please tell me you didn’t sleep with that obviously sinister man?”
I crack a smile. “Pressed slacks and a button-down with a watch that costs a year’s worth of tuition?”
“Patrick Bateman in his Hamptons wardrobe?” She nods. “He was here an hour ago.”
My shoulders sink with relief. “Oh, thank god.” I did not want to ask Stacie for a ride to my car, but I figured it was still parked over by the frat house. “I love and hate Killian’s friends in equal measure.”
Her eyebrows rise with interest. “And who is Killian?”
I sigh, a faint smile claiming my lips. “I’ll tell you later.” I grab the dish off the counter and bend to put it down for Toast. “Come here, baby. Time for breakfast.”
Toast prances over with absolutely no sense of urgency. She brushes up against my leg on the way to the dish, so I lean down to give her a stroke.
I hate leaving her again. I’ll be gone for most of the day, and I had planned to wake up early so I could spend a little time with her first.
Stacie walks over to the table and comes back with a car key, but I frown when I see it because… that’s not my car key.
It’s Killian’s.
“Um… this is the key he gave you?”
“Is it not your key?”
“It’s not,” I confirm.
That means my car is probably still parked over by the frat house.
I guess it also means Killian knows I stole his car and he isn’t mad about it, so at least that’s good.
“All right, I’ll deal with that later. I’m going to have to drive this to work.”
I hurry back to the bedroom to get dressed. Once I’ve pulled on clothes, I quickly consult my iPad to see if my phone is still showing up.
It is. Still at the frat house.
If I didn’t have to work, I’d try to get it back, but I don’t have the time.
I barely take the time to pull my hair back into a ponytail and grab my purse. Thankfully, since I changed into a smaller, lightweight purse for the party last night, the one I usually carry has my ID and credit cards in it.
As if I don’t have enough problems right now, my stomach growls, reminding me I didn’t have breakfast. I grab a banana and a granola bar on the way out the door, but I’ll have to save one for lunch, so I expect to be hungry most of the day.
It feels weird to be getting into Killian’s higher end car instead of my own.
After settling my refillable water bottle in the cupholder, I drop my purse in the passenger seat, and when I do, I notice a phone on the seat with a scrap of paper tucked beneath it. I frown, grabbing the phone and waking up the screen.
It’s not my phone, but it’s a phone.
The paper underneath is long and skinny like a receipt. I turn it over and see it is a receipt from Canada Goose. I guess Hampton’s Bateman didn’t have any notebook paper on him, so he used what he had. The note reads:
Brynn,
Kill said to keep the car for the day.
He didn’t want you to be without a phone, so you can use this burner.
Try to stay out of trouble, but his phone number and mine are saved in the event that you need us.
I don’t have time for this, but I’m too curious, so I open the phone and check out the contacts.
There are two numbers.
One says Killian, so I know which is which.
The other says Ripley.
I tap Killian’s name and send him a message that just says, “Thank you,” then I pull onto the road and head for work.