Chapter 29
Habit, ritual, routine.
We were all slaves to one of them. We all had things that comforted us in our day-to-day lives. I made a space in my routine to learn Carmen Vita’s comforts.
I learned the rhythm of her nights, how she moved when she was bored, if she was nice to customer service workers, how she tucked loose hair behind her ear when she laughed at a joke she didn’t get, or didn’t think was actually funny.
I watched without a real plan at first, as if seeing her would turn my hunger into something less jagged. I wanted to let her live about her miserable life. I wanted to let her continue to be beaten down by her older brother, Tyler. Let her live without my interference.
But then the images of that night flashed as sure as the feed on the camera. She was moaning, her blood seeping down her legs like a beautiful, soft stream.
Like his.
Seeing her smile with the same mask Shiloh had used so many times hurt more than I expected. That small curl of his lips, like a secret had been given away. That was the point. She had it now, this woman had remnants of Shiloh’s come inside her. She could be carrying Shiloh’s child none the wiser.
She was the first person ever to make Shiloh break. And for that, she had to be ruined, shattered to a point where there was no return.
Shiloh had to see what he did, understand that he couldn’t have one foot in the dark while dancing in his fucking light.
I wanted to burn away every piece of the broken veil he hid behind. Replace his peace with the knowledge that I’d been there, too, that he hadn’t taken anything that couldn’t be reclaimed on my terms. That he hadn’t broken me.
The stalking wasn’t fancy by any means. At the week’s end, I was fucking bored. This mundane, abused woman spent more time tending to her own inflicted wounds and her clients than she did anything else.
Tyler was a constant in her fucking life. And seeing that dick bag, even from a distance, made the hair on my neck stand at attention. Maybe this would be a mercy for sweet Carmen. She didn’t want to live only to exist for Tyler’s demands.
This hunt needed to be about patience and attention to detail. I learned her route home and the bus stop she preferred when Tyler wouldn’t let her borrow his car. They were dirt poor despite the flashy style of housing.
Their parents lived off their children’s blood and sweat.
Tyler had to stoop to being a fucking gym coach. All of this was worth knowing. I made a mental note to pay him a fucking visit when this was all done. Men weren’t particularly interesting to add to my roster, but Tyler Veering didn’t deserve to breathe oxygen either.
Carmen was headed for the shortcut through the municipal lot, where the light was out, and the CCTV never caught anything. I didn’t know why she’d chosen it, but the night had finally turned interesting.
I had learned to follow at a distance, where I was a shadow instead of a man. On the fourth night, I let myself cross a line.
I sat at her bar and let the smoke curl around me like an invitation. I ordered what she had recommended without tasting it. She watched me watch her with a neat curiosity and zero caution since I began breaking down her walls.
“Why do you suddenly love this place?” she said suddenly, dropping a cup on the counter that rattled like a small bell.
“Something to love started coming here,” I replied.
I let my voice be softer than I felt for her, knowing it was exactly what she needed.
She had ignored all the catcall-type men, and I didn’t bother taking an angle of flattery.
Being a steady presence was all I needed.
It got her to look me in the eye, measure me, and try to decide whether I was worth the risk to her fragility.
We talked daily.
She yapped about our shitty town and her shittier brother.
She hid the dark bruises on her skin well, as if I knew every story they held. She told me about wanting to get out of Normal and start her business somewhere far away.
I asked the right questions. No pressures, no promises, and because the best way to pull someone toward you is to be the one who listens, I kept my words short.
People will step into the shape you make for them if you’re careful and precise.
Finally, after six nights, she was laughing at something I said and leaned across the bar, careless and warm, her cheeks flushed and her glass a bit emptier than usual.
“Be honest with me, Harding. What made you start coming here every night?’ she said.
“Honestly?” I said slowly. “You, Carmen.”
My answer caught her off guard, and she blushed a beautiful crimson. Like that fucking night. The same red as the blood that had spilled around Shiloh’s cock.
“I haven’t gotten the chance to see what you’ve made of yourself, darling. Maybe I should change that.”
That blush deepened, and she bit her lip.
C’mon, Carmen. Let me into your lair. Let me show you what kind of monster I am so that I can create a masterpiece out of you for my own creation.
“Maybe…I can show you.”
Bingo.
I kept the bullshit banter going, giving her glass after glass of alcohol and watching as her inhibitions melted away like the ice in my untouched drink.
When the night finally settled, I walked her outside, letting her see how mean the world got after midnight, the corner streetlight flickering like a dying soul.
She smelled of bar varnish and cheap soap. A life she’d learned to make do with, and die with. Something in my chest hollowed and then hardened for the task at hand. I welcomed my darkness and smothered the light Shiloh had left in me, closing my hand around it like a firefly.
“You’re not like the others, Carrington. And nothing, like people say, either.” Carmen said as we approached her salon.
I heard the words, and I thought immediately of Shiloh, how soft he’d sounded when he’d given himself to me, how guilty, and how undone. It was stupid and perfect how my mind rewired her words into a memory of him. “You just look at me like…I don’t know.”
“Like you are breathtakingly beautiful?” I said to her, catching her chin in my grip and forcing her to look into my eyes. “Like I want to taste your skin.”
The truth, but of course it was to replace anything of Shiloh. Replace his darkness with my own, and shower him in his one and only mistake.
“Well, here we are. My little home away from home…I uh…I sometimes sleep here. It’s better than home, because my roommate is my brother, and he’s—well, he’s not always…the warmest man.”
I let her babble, and when her hands fumbled for the keys, I helped her, knowing exactly which one turned the lock, but letting her follow the ritual so I could follow mine.
“I can be warm, Carmen,” I whispered, making her shiver.
She swallowed hard and finally managed to get the lock turned, opening the door. “I hope you don’t mind it being small.”
Her slurred speech was hesitant. Like, I really gave a shit about her small-box-of-a-salon.
“It’s wonderful, Carmen. Like you. Where do you sleep? Show me your craft.”
So I can show you mine.
Carmen led me to the bedroom, where a small cot lay on the ground, and nothing else would fit. It was like a closet in here. Nothing more than a place to rest for the night.
Did she dream of him here? Did she cry out with moans of his memory?
It was time to own the effect Shiloh had left.
Time to remind my dear Sunshine that there needs to be a balance between light and dark.
“I know it’s not much, but I—” she said, and I cut her off with a firm kiss pressed into her lips.
“I’m going to be honest,” I said. “You wanted honesty, yes?”
She frowned, curiosity creasing her forehead. “I—yes?”
“I don’t care where we are, Carmen. A hovel or a castle will make no difference in what I want from you.”
She blinked, her intoxicated brain not catching on to anything.
“You. I want to fuck you and make myself forget anyone before you.”
The blinking continued, and she gasped. I wasn’t good at asking for this shit. Hell, I never asked, but to truly erase my Sunshine from her skin, before I painted it on his. I had to try to do this right. I needed to feign the light he didn’t give so that I could snuff it out.
“Will you let me destroy that perfect, fucking body? Will you give yourself to me, Carmen Vita?”
She laughed, a nervous sound. “That’s…why? Why would you want me? That’s silly.”
“Do I need a reason?” I said.
I meant it. And then I let my face be something else. Flat, patient, and cold as a stone you drop in a well, never to surface again. The calm before a raging storm. The bait before the trap.
She tried to make a joke about meeting strangers and never having much interest in sex because her past with sex didn’t have a great ending.
Essentially denying me. I found myself feeling sorry for a second, but not sorry enough to stop what I had to do.
Yet I still felt it enough to note I felt bad?
I could allow myself that small amount of human emotion.
She took a step back, the kind that makes a person visible, and the light caught her eyes.
“I don’t want trouble, Carrington. I’m not one of those girls,” she said, the liquid courage fading as her fear took over.
“I don’t want to make trouble, Carmen.” It was a sentence built out of truth.
I reached out and pushed her, once, so soft that it might have been an accident.
Her ankle hit the small cot on the floor, and she cursed, falling to her backside on top of it.
Her squeak of surprise yanked me back to that night.
And all I could hear was Shiloh’s moans and growls mixed with her pathetic whimpering—such a small human sound.
She looked up at me, ready to snap, to shame the man who’d pushed her, and wanted her body.
That would have been safe.
I could have walked away then, let her live her puny life until her path ultimately led to her ending her own life one day, when the knife she used on herself slipped too deep.