Dalton
SPACE
NATALIA
A garish pink door stares at me, silently asking if I’ll knock. I remember sitting on the hood of a car, sun beaming down on me in my denim shorts and tank top, a wine cooler in my hand, watching my eight-year-old niece paint, sloppily slinging it everywhere. Sarah and I giggled, content to let her have fun. We shared a smile and a knowing look.
Our parents never said it and neither did Sarah, but each time her test score surpassed mine or her report cards boasted more A’s, I withdrew more and more. Leaving home for college was the most freeing thing I could’ve done.
Several shitty boyfriends and years of therapy later, Sarah and I reconciled, shedding the animosity of our youth, allowing her to open the door into her life with Lauren to me. I never appreciated it more until now. Before I lose my nerve, my knuckles rap on the door, anxiously waiting for my little sister to open the door for me again. I wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t after the last thing I said.
It eases open cautiously, a wary Sarah running shrewd eyes up and down my frame.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt, tears clogging my throat. Wordlessly, she throws the door open and pulls me into a hug.
All the emotions of the past forty-eight hours race to the surface and I sag against her, letting out wrenching sobs, body shaking with the force of my tears. I missed my sister, tightening my grip on her. It was a stupid, selfish thing for me to say the last time I spoke to her and pales compared to everything I’ve experienced lately.
I needed this, inhaling her sweet vanilla scent, letting it calm me, nostalgia welling up. Sarah has used the same shampoo since the day our mother let us start picking out our own hair products.
It grounds me. Why couldn’t figuring things out with Dalton be this easy?
* * *
R ed liquid swirls, hypnotizing me.
“Are you going to drink it or make love to it?” Sarah jokes from across the room, seated in the dark-haired man’s lap she introduced as Zaiden. Another Lasher. I overheard her call him Dayton while pouring me a glass of wine, but maybe that’s something shared between just the two of them.
Bringing the glass to my lips, I gulp it down, needing the potent liquid to relax my muscles and reassure me my life isn’t about to implode any further.
“The man that took you, are you sure Dalton is his name?” Zaiden asks, rubbing a palm up and down Sarah’s back. Glancing at his face makes me wince, the scars sending phantom pain spreading across my own face. At least two-inch scars stretch from the sides of his mouth to nearly his earlobe. I don’t want to know who inflicted those.
I nod at his question, but how certain can I be? He’s a killer.
“And his mother is Morgan Daniels?” Zaiden presses again and I’m tempted to rise from the sofa and smack him for the constant questions. Yes, you have a brother and he’s a homicidal psychopath.
That can fuck like a pornstar despite being a damn virgin . Down, kitty, I chastise my libido.
“Are you sure he won’t come here looking for you?” Sarah asks, a hint of worry in her voice. Dammit. I hope I haven’t endangered them. All I can do is hope on a wish that Dalton respects my request for space.
“I can’t be sure, Sarah. He kidnapped me once. It’s not outside the realm of possibilities that he’d do it again.” Wincing at my tone coming out harsher than I intended, I open my mouth, but she waves me away with a hand.
“Alright, you can have Lauren’s old room. Or sleep on the sofa if it’s more comfortable,” she says, ending the interrogation. My eyes dart between her and Zaiden, wondering if she told him yet and if I’ll have to listen to my sister getting dicked down while hiding out from the man who gave me the best sex of my life.
How fucking ironic is my life right now?
* * *
DALTON
Two days. Two fucking days is how long it takes to break me. I can’t take it anymore, glaring down into the chest cavity of ex number five. How many dicks did my girl fuck in her lifetime? It took a deep dive down her social media to find the five pricks I did.
Scowling, I tug my gloves off, tossing them into a wastebasket, leaning against the slab. This latest excavation leaves me unfulfilled. As did the other four, swinging from hooks I’d drilled into the ceiling out of boredom.
A steady drip, drip, drip bounces around the room, some of them still leaking blood into pails stationed beneath their arms. I hung them feet up, digging hooks into their rib cages, attached to a length of chain and attaching that to the hooks in the ceiling. They died hours ago, but I couldn’t decide what I wanted as a trophy.
A waste of meat. It’s all Natalia’s fault. Before her, I wasted nothing. Fuck this. I’m going to get my girl, even if I have to drag her kicking and screaming from Raven and Joke face.
As predicted, I tracked my flower the same day she left me while respecting her space, watching her come and go from her sister’s house. Joker kept scanning the neighborhood, eyes sweeping up and down, but fuck you, novice. This was not my first stalking, but it will be my last. There’s only one person I want to kidnap, and she fucking left me.
That was two days ago and I can't take anymore of this space . Maybe because they were too scared of what I'd do to them, but no one asked for space from me. No, they just ran as soon as they saw me coming, calling on whatever deity they worship, piss leaking down their legs. At least my flower hadn't pissed herself that first night I took her.
Giving Natalia's dead ex one smack across the face for good measure, I turn on a heel. Uncaring of the mess I leave behind, I stalk out of my playroom, pounding up the stairs and striding straight for the front door and my motorcycle. Natalia is coming home or my name isn’t Zachary.
Dead fucker. I looked up his obituary, and he’d already kicked the bucket at the hands of a Xavier Lasher. How dumb are you to let your own kid kill you? Well, I guess as dumb as Samantha. I bet she didn’t see that blade coming.
I think I’ll like Xavier as soon as he gets over me kidnapping his girlfriend’s aunt. Water under the bridge, bro. As Elsa said, let it fucking go.
One thing I’m not letting go is Natalia. Here I come, baby.