Stalker Problems - Chapter 18 - The Escape
I shook my head. “Hell. No. I’m not riding that thing.”
“You’d rather kill Frankie?” asked Ryder.
“Than go splat on the pavement? Yes,” I hissed.
“Good luck with that. And the SWAT team.”
“I thought it was the FBI?”
“Right…them.” He checked his watch. “They should be here any minute.” He adjusted his grip on the zipline and took a few steps back.
Then I heard it. The door breaking. The officers yelling, “FBI!”
Holy shit. My heart felt like it was about to explode out of my chest. I couldn’t get enough air. All I could picture was myself in prison and splattered in the middle of traffic. Somehow at the same time. I couldn’t move.
“Raven, look at me,” said Ryder. He grabbed my chin and forced me to meet his gaze.
“I won’t drop you. I’ll keep you safe. I promise.
” The sincerity in his voice. The look in his eyes.
I knew he was telling the truth. And most of all…
his hands on me made my whole body feel like it was on fire.
In a good way. Not in a Matthew Caldwell flaming penis way.
And in that moment, I knew I had to go with him.
Because I didn’t want him to stop touching me.
And I certainly wasn’t safe here. I’d joined an apparently illegal sex club.
I’d tried to rape Dr. Lyons. I was wanted on so many levels.
“Fine. But if you drop me, I’ll kill you.”
For a second he paused, like he was going to leave me behind.
“I’m kidding. Please don’t leave me.” I jumped into his arms and he laughed.
“Hold on tight,” he said.
I wrapped my arms around his muscular torso and hooked my legs behind him. I felt so small wrapped around him. And so safe. Even though we were about to jump off a freaking building.
“Three, two…” As he said, “one,” he jumped off the roof.
I hung on for dear life with my face buried in his chest. The wind whipped my hair everywhere.
My wig! Was my wig going to fly off? Or did it already?
What if it flew off back on the balcony?
It would have my DNA all over it. The police would have my identity.
Before I could totally freak out - both about the wig and the cars below us - we slammed into a mattress and fell onto another.
And there we were…two fugitives tangled up in each other after making an epic escape from the FBI.
I breathed in the scent of blueberry pie mixed with sweat. It was intoxicating.
“Are you sniffing me?” He smiled down at me.
“What? No.” I rolled away from him. “I think a uh, bug flew in my nose.” I coughed and turned away.
“I didn’t mind. I was just wondering. I probably smell like blueberries.”
“And sweat.”
“I thought you weren’t smelling me?” he asked.
“Well not intentionally,” I said. “But how could I not when you’re all up in my business?”
“You mean preventing you from falling to your death?”
“Something like that. We were lucky there was a mattress propped on the wall like that to break our fall.” I looked down at the mattress we were on. The owner must have gotten a new one and forgotten how hard it is to get rid of an old one.
“Lucky. Right. Well, we’re not out of the woods yet. They’ll see the zipline. We need to disappear. Follow me.” Ryder grabbed my hand and tugged me through some glass doors into an apartment.
“Whose place is this?”
“No idea, but I hope they have some clothes that fit us.” He started opening dressers and rummaging through the clothes.
“Now we’re robbing someone?” I was going to end up in prison for sure.
He pulled out his wallet and tossed a wad of money onto the bed. “That should cover it. Try this on.” He tossed me a slinky red dress.
“Turn around,” I said. “I’m not just going to undress in front of some guy I just met.”
“Okay. But you better not peek at me either, then.”
I turned around and pulled my shirt over my head.
I had my pants halfway unbuttoned when the sound of Ryder’s pants unzipping called to me.
I snuck a look over my shoulder. Damn. I had pictured him out of his suits a thousand times…
er, once or twice…but I had never imagined he’d look this good.
I wondered how many times he’d pictured me naked. The dirty stalker.
And then he caught me.
“Hey!” I screamed. “You promised not to look.”
He laughed. “So did you.” His eyes traveled to my bra.
I put my arm over my chest. “I was just checking to make sure you weren’t looking!”
“So was I.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Fine.”
“Fine.” He couldn’t even hide the smile from his lips.
We both turned back around and got back to dressing.
The red dress was just stretchy enough to fit over my big ass.
But when I pulled it up around my chest, I realized that I had entirely the wrong bra for it.
T-shirt bras and cocktail dresses were generally not compatible, especially dresses with necklines as deep as this one. Guess I have to let the girls free.
I checked to make sure Ryder wasn’t peaking again and then unhooked my bra. His head started to turn at the sound of it, but he was a gentleman and stayed true to his word. He also looked fantastic in his tight boxer briefs…which I shouldn’t have been looking at.
“All done?” he asked a few seconds later.
“Yup. You?”
“Mhm.”
We both turned around. He gave me the up-down, which I guess in this case was okay since he was checking to see if the dress fit. Fine, it would have been okay either way. I wanted him to look at me.
“It looks perfect,” he said. “But it’s missing something.”
Yeah, a bra. Were my nipples everywhere? They probably were. They always acted up at the worst times.
Instead of a bra, he tossed me a pair of strappy black heels.
“Are you sure these are the best shoes for an escape?” I asked.
“Would you rather wear sneakers with that dress?”
“I’m not sure I’ll even be able to walk in these.
” They were at least five inches tall…exactly the kind of shoes that Joe would have hated me wearing because he was a short loser.
Which made me think: is this my first wish coming true?
I had wished for shoes. And revenge on Joe. Half of that had now been fulfilled.
“You’ll figure it out,” Ryder said. “Just don’t step on any grates. And avoid sand. Or anything soft.”
I started to strap them on. “I didn’t realize you were such an expert at walking in heels. Do you do it often?”
“No, I design…” he started coughing. Or fake coughing. For the first time, my stalker was the one who was tongue-tied. But he recovered quickly. “My calves would look amazing in heels. Don’t be jealous.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. He was right.
They would. But he’d also look super gay.
I much preferred the shiny black dress shoes he had just laced up.
Add in the tuxedo he’d stolen from whoever owned this apartment, and he looked amazing.
I didn’t know where our escape was headed, but part of me wanted to take it right onto the king-sized bed.
“Let’s go,” he said, grabbing my hand and pulling me into the hallway.
So much for taking it to the bed.
My heart was pounding as the elevator opened. I kind of expected us to be immediately swarmed by FBI agents. But instead it was empty. Ryder held the door for me.
“So what’s the plan?” I asked.
“Get a taxi. Go get some dinner far away from here. Wait for things to cool down. And then go back to our normal lives and forget any of this ever happened.”
Dinner with my stalker sounded perfect. But forgetting about him forever? No way. Was that really what he wanted?
Ryder hailed the first taxi we saw. And it stopped!
What the hell, taxi drivers? It always took me like twenty tries to get them to notice me.
But when a man like Ryder waved them down, they didn’t think twice.
Maybe all taxi drivers were gay and couldn’t resist chauffeuring hot men around all day. Figures.
We switched cabs a few times before arriving at our destination: Trilogy. It was a super fancy restaurant that had just opened a few months ago. Chastity couldn’t stop talking about how much she wanted some hunk to take her here. And by take her here , I mean get freaky with her in the bathroom.
I was too busy looking around at all the crystal chandeliers to listen to what Ryder said to get the hostess to give us a table, but whatever he said, it worked. He probably flirted with her. I glared at the little two-cent trollop as she showed us to our table. Stay away from my stalker!
“So are we safe?” I asked.
He nodded. “I believe so. Which means we get to sit back and enjoy our dinner.”
How was he so relaxed right now? The freaking FBI was after us and he was calmly perusing the menu like it was a normal night. But he also probably hadn’t tried to rape a doctor recently.
“What are you gonna order?” I asked.
He laughed like I’d just made a joke. “That’s a good one. Which course are you most excited for?”
I looked back at the menu. It was just a list of the seven courses we would be eating, whether we wanted to or not.
I thought I’d learned a lot about food while completely reinventing the recipes for Dickson & Son’s Sugarcakes (yes…
that was really the name of Joe’s family bakery), but this menu was beyond me.
I didn’t understand a word of what was on it.
“What in the world is a balut?”
“Wow, it’s been years since I’ve had a balut. Takes me back to my days in Cambodia.” He pulled out his notebook and jotted something down. Looked around the restaurant. And made another note.
Takes him back? He didn’t look that old. And hadn’t he left that notebook in his other suit? “Did you grow up there?”
“What?” He shifted uncomfortably. “Oh, uh. No. Just visited. Anyway, you were asking about baluts? They’re boiled fertilized eggs. Absolutely delectable.”
I gagged a little.
“They’re also our fourth course, apparently,” added Ryder. “Well, I guess for me it’ll be my fifth course.”
“Huh?” I asked.
A smile played on the corner of his mouth. “Yeah, my first course was that blueberry pie you tossed in my face.”
My eyes got wide. Oh God, he does remember. It was too late to duck under the table. He’d already seen me since we’d been hanging out for a while now. What the hell do I do? Where was a dumpster or a lake when I needed it? Maybe there was a lobster tank somewhere around here…
“Did you really think I didn’t see you? You know there was a window in the door, right?”
I could feel the heat rushing to my face. There was no escaping this awkward conversation. “I’m so sorry.”
“I know. I could feel your remorse. Especially when you laughed and ran away.”
Was he mad? Shit, he was mad. “I’m so so sorry.”
“It’s okay. It was actually kind of cute.”
Cute? I didn’t want him to think I was cute. I wanted him to think I was a sex goddess. Raven Black the seductress. “You can throw a pie in my face if it makes you feel better.” Great, that was super sexy. Not.
He laughed.
“I’ll just stand there and take it, I swear.”
“Oh, I know you will, baby.” He leaned forward slightly. “But it’s not going to involve a blueberry pie.”
Holy shit. I crossed my legs under the table.
He was staring at me so intently. What did he mean by that?
Was he going to take me back to a sex dungeon?
Was he going to bend me right over this table in front of all these people?
Maybe they were Society members. The guy at the table next to us was wearing a black watch.
But no one else was. And the Society had just been shut down by the FBI.
Or maybe he just meant the pie would be lemon meringue instead of blueberry.
“Don’t turn around,” said Ryder. His playful smile was gone. “But a Gestapo agent just walked in.”
“Gestapo?!” I whispered yelled. “Now Nazis are chasing us too? I thought it was just the FBI?”
“Right. I meant FBI. I always get those two mixed up.”
Was that some sort of weird political commentary about the FBI being a bunch of Nazis? If so, I might have finally met someone as strange as me. I started to turn around to get a look.
He grabbed my hand. “I said don’t look.”
Oops. But it was really hard not to look when he specifically told me I couldn’t. I wanted to see what he thought a Nazi looked like. Probably bald and fat. Or would they have Hitler-staches?!
“I’m going to pretend to go to the bathroom. In twenty seconds, calmly put your napkin on the table and meet me at the kitchen doors. Just do as I say and everything will be fine.”
Fine? “Don’t leave me out here.”
“I’m not leaving you. I promise.” His thumb slowly ran down my palm as he stood up. “I’ll be waiting for you.”
Of course he thought everything would be fine! He was leaving me as bait!