Chapter 5 Dare
FIVE
DARE
Ihad no time to think. No time to process what it meant or why his ex had made Zach feel like that. I just ran.
I ran like I was running for my life, and I didn’t stop until I got outside ready to throw down with whoever made Zach faint from fear alone.
It took me all of two seconds to get oriented with Zach’s apartment and make my way to the patch of grass facing his window. My fists were ready to be soaked in blood no matter the consequences.
But as I approached the man in black, a dark van squealed to a stop in front of him and he jumped inside before I could do anything.
The van turned around, and I caught a glimpse of the asshole who had the nerve to smirk at me just before he shut the door and disappeared into the afternoon traffic.
“You fucking asshole,” I grumbled under my breath.
It was pointless chasing after them. By the time I’d get to my car they’d be long gone. Factor in the addition of the van and its unknown number of occupants, and there were too many dangerous variables that I didn’t want to explore. Not on my own, anyway.
I noted down the plate number on my phone before I forgot it and walked back to the front entrance and pressed the buzzer for Zach’s apartment.
He didn’t respond.
My gut instinct wanted me to keep pressing it until he opened but I’d already scared him once today, I didn’t need to cause him any more anxiety. Especially when Victor was out of the picture for now and posed no immediate threat to Zach. So I did the next best thing. I was patient.
A few minutes later, I buzzed again.
There was a crackle and a soft voice croaked out a quiet greeting.
“Hello?” I didn’t know if he was trying to conceal his voice or if he’d become petrified again, but it didn’t sound like him and that…it made my stomach ache.
“It’s Dare. Open up. He’s gone,” I said.
The door purred to life, and I pushed it to let myself in. As I waited for the elevator, the lady who’d let me in the first time poked her head out of her door on the ground floor and stared at me.
“Is everything okay?” she asked.
No. Everything wasn’t okay. Zach was in danger, he was awash with fear, his business was gone, and his ex was stalking his house. Nothing was okay. Nothing. But I couldn’t tell Zach’s innocent neighbor that.
“Everything is fine. Thank you for checking,” I said.
“What was all that running about?” She raised an eyebrow.
I opened my mouth but found nothing to say so I smiled instead.
“I…I thought I left something in the car,” I said.
She opened her mouth ready to continue with the interrogation but in that moment the elevator bell rang, and I slid the steel grated door open.
“Sorry. I got to go,” I told her and made my escape.
Zach’s apartment door was closed as I approached it and when I reached it I mentally reprimanded myself for the way I’d knocked earlier. I didn’t know what had possessed me. What normal human being banged on a door of a person whose life had gone up in ruins?
I pursed my lips and when I rapped on the door I held my breath as if that would make the action softer.
“It’s me. Dare,” I said.
I looked into the eyehole, and I was sure I caught a reflection of an eye before I heard the rattling of a chain and the bolt turning.
The sounds made my heart beat faster, and my blood boil. What had that asshole done to that beautiful lively man to make him so damn terrified?
The door crept open, and I inhaled.
Be gentle, Dare. No matter what, be gentle.
Zach had been through enough already. I didn’t need to scare him further just because I was angry at the situation. A situation I knew very little about, no less.
“Hi,” he whispered, and I felt a pang in my chest. I didn’t know if it was my heart breaking at his wide red eyes, or my heart warming at his attempt at a smile but what I did know was that this man needed protecting. He was too good, too innocent to live in fear.
“May I come in?” I asked and tried to copy his smile though I was sure it looked nowhere near as perfect as his.
He nodded and stepped aside, letting me in before closing the door again and fastening the security chain back on. I bit my lip.
“You…” I started but stopped.
If it made him feel safer what was the harm in letting him lock it?
He turned to me, and I shook my head.
“Are you feeling better?”
He smiled.
“I am, thank you,” he said, his voice half as spirited as it once was.
“Do…do you want to tell me what happened?” I asked.
Zach shrugged and walked to the couch. I followed him.
“Nothing. I’m good,” he said.
“What do you mean nothing happened? Your truck is gone,” I said, staring at the man.
“Oh. That. Yeah. The…the truck is gone.”
He sounded absent-minded, staring at a spot on the wall opposite me as if facing me was the hardest thing he had to do. But I could tell there was more to the story. I could tell this had nothing to do with me and everything to do with this…bastard ex of his.
“Why would your ex do that to you?” I asked. I needed to get to the bottom of this somehow.
“Oh, ah…because he hates me. I…I dumped him and he…he didn’t take it well.”
He gave me a fleeting glance before he returned his attention to that damned spot on the wall.
“That’s the understatement of the century,” I said.
He sighed.
“I don’t know what to tell you,” he said, looking at me.
“How about the truth?” I said with as much control and patience as I could muster.
Zach licked his lips and his eyelids drooped heavily over his eyes, making me want to reach out for him.
To pull him back into my arms. To secure him there like I’d done minutes ago when he fainted.
I would have held him forever if I could.
The smell of his body still lingered on me like a perfume I never wanted to get rid of.
“It…it took a lot for me to leave him. Victor…he’s obsessed with me. I couldn’t just find another place to live, I had to disappear, to go as far away as possible from him to find my peace. Obviously, I didn’t go far enough.”
My muscles tensed just hearing the defeat in his voice, seeing it in his expression and in the way he barely held himself together.
“So that man is dangerous,” I stated.
Zach opened his mouth as if to disagree and I interjected.
“He just burned down your truck. There’s no question he’s dangerous. And now he knows where you live.”
Zach nodded.
“Well, I for one don’t want to find out what happens if he gets closer to you than he already has.”
“That’s why I need to go,” he said.
“Go?” I was taken aback. “Go where?”
“Anywhere. Somewhere away from here.”
“But you can’t.”
“I have to.”
“This is your home,” I insisted.
He couldn’t leave. I couldn’t let him do that. I wouldn’t let him abandon this place because of that fucker.
“It…it was good while it lasted. But I can make a home somewhere else.”
I huffed.
“You shouldn’t have to.”
Zach smiled a sad smile that twisted at my guts just looking at it.
“I can’t stay here. He won’t let me live in peace. It’s okay. It is what it is.”
The twist in my guts wound itself tighter, making me feel sick.
Not seeing him every day would be unbearable but not even knowing where he was and if he was okay, if he was safe, that would be an inconceivable level of torture I couldn’t live with.
That I wouldn’t live with.
“Well, I haven’t,” I said.
“What?” Zach asked.
“I’m not going to let you go just because of that dickhead.”
“I have no choice. I have to go,” he stuttered.
“And what happens when he finds you again?”
“He won’t,” Zach shrugged but his expression told me how uncertain he was of his statement.
“What if he does?”
“Then I guess I’ll run again,” he said.
“And you’re going to spend your life running, looking over your shoulder, hoping he hasn’t tracked you down? That’s not a way to live.”
Zach sighed and fell back on the couch.
“And what are my options? Staying here and letting him get to me?”
“No,” I grumbled. “You let me deal with him.”
“I couldn’t. You don’t understand how dangerous he is. He…will hurt you.”
His voice broke at the word “hurt,” and I couldn’t stomach this any longer. Not when I could imagine every possible way this man had hurt Zach in the past and how much he could again if he wasn’t stopped.
“I’m not so easy to hurt,” I told him.
“I know you’re a big guy but—”
“I’m not just a big guy, Zach. I’m an ex-SEAL. I can take care of myself. And I can take care of you.”
“You’re what?”
“A SEAL,” I repeated.
Zach’s eyes creased and he flapped his hands to his sides.
“Like a baby seal?” he asked, and the joke was so unexpected, as was his reaction, that I burst into laughter before I could stop myself.
Zach stared at me, his smile turning soft and slightly amused for the first time today.
“No. Not a seal like a baby seal. A Navy SEAL,” I managed to stammer in between chuckles that made my belly ache.
His eyes went wide, and his mouth turned into a perfect o-shape.
“Oh,” he squealed.
“I assumed you knew.”
“How would I?” he said, frowning.
“Well, you’re neighbors with Teddy.”
“Teddy was a SEAL?”
I laughed again.
“You didn’t know? What the hell did you think he was, given the way he went in to save Wesley last week?”
Zach grimaced.
“I’m still not a hundred percent sure what happened with Wesley, but I assumed he was in the military or something. I didn’t know either of you were Navy SEALs.”
“Well, now you do. So you know I can handle a pest like your ex. Will you let me?”
Zach blinked and after a moment he shook his head.
“It’s fine. I don’t want to implicate you—”
“But I want to be implicated,” I said, making him glare at me again. “I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you.”
“Oh,” he said.
“So?” I asked.
“I…uhm…I don’t know.” I raised an eyebrow. “Okay, I guess,” he said. “What do I need to do?”
I smiled and without thinking, reached for him and gave his knee a reassuring squeeze.
“For starters, you need to go pack.”
“Pa—I thought you wanted me to stay.”
“I do,” I chuckled. “But you’re not staying here. It’s not safe, even with Teddy next door.”
“Then where am I going to stay? I have nowhere to go—”
“You’re coming with me,” I said.
“With you? With you, where?”
“My home,” I said.
I hadn’t even decided that when I spoke, but it was the natural thing to do.
It was the only safe place I knew, away from prying eyes.
And most importantly, close to me, where I could protect him no matter what while I looked for that dickhead and put the fear of God in him like he had done with Zach.
Because one thing was for certain. When I found Victor, he would pay for everything he’d done to Zach and then some.