30. Lilith
CHAPTER THIRTY
P ale blue eyes locked onto mine as I spun around. His lips curled, but there was nothing close to a smile there. Just teeth. Something mean, bitter, and too familiar.
My limbs turned to stone.
He took a step closer, then another.
I took one back, my shoulders hitting the rough brick behind me.
Trapped.
“Clark, what the hell?”
“Lilith, I’ve missed you so damn much,” his voice was raw and cloying. “I’ve not stopped thinking about you.”
What? My pulse stumbled, cold dread sliding down my spine. “Clark, I—”
“Oh, don’t act surprised,” he cut me off, voice dripping with something sharp and sticky sweet. “You’re my girl, Lilith.”
I blinked, confusion tangling tight around my ribs. “I’m not.”
“Of course you are.” His hands twitched at his side, fingers flexing. “Do you even care where I’ve been?”
Every instinct screamed at me to run, move, do something—but my body refused. “Clark, I—”
His jaw clenched. A humourless laugh scraped past his throat. “I was attacked Lilith. Mugged. Right after I left your house. Had my money stolen, my face fucked up.”
I stared at him. “What?”
His breath came short and fast, eyes gleaming under the dim light, something dark and ugly swirling behind them.
“You think I just disappeared for no reason?” His voice dropped lower, venomous, sharp as a knife. “I had to take weeks off work. Weeks . Healing. Dealing with that bu llshit. I couldn’t do a thing to show you how much I wanted us to work. And you didn’t even think to check on me.”
I shook my head, swallowing hard. “Why would I check on you?”
I hadn’t even thought about him. Not once. Not for a second. I’d been too caught up in my own mess. Too busy riding on the high of this whole ridiculous stalker whirlwind to even spare a thought for him.
So damn careless.
I’d let my guard down. Gotten distracted. I wasn’t careful, wasn’t thinking straight, and now…
God, I was an idiot.
His lips curled into something vicious. “Because you love me.”
The words shot through my brain, through my chest, through the cold reality of what this was.
“No. I don’t,” I snapped.
He stepped closer, caging me in. The sour, sharp stench of alcohol hit me like a wave, making my stomach churn.
“Yes, you do,” he spat through gritted teeth. “Don’t fucking lie to me. Do. Not. Lie. I’ve given you so much time now. Did you not get my little peace offering?”
What the hell was he on about? ‘’What peace offering?” I asked.
His hot, rancid breath fanned across my cheek. “The chocolates? The really damn expensive chocolates?”
The chocolates? What chocolates? What the—
My brain ground to a halt.
No. No, that wasn’t him. It wasn’t.
Mr. Stalker had said ‘you’re welcome.’
Why the fuck would he have said that if he didn’t even send them?
Oh.
For fuck’s sake.
Did the idiot think I was thanking him for the orgasm?
“I didn’t know they were from you…”
His expression twitched. “Who the hell else would they have been from?”
My tongue was heavy and useless in my mouth.
“Oh, don’t tell me you’ve moved on already. That’s disgusting, Lilith.” His chest heaved with barely restrained rage. “All I wanted was for you to be happy with me. And you don’t even care. Just left me like I meant nothing to you.”
Brick behind me.
Clark in front of me.
Nowhere to go.
“I made mistakes, Lilith,” he muttered, shaking his head, like I was some stubborn child refusing to own up to spilling milk. “We all make mistakes. I’m not perfect, but you know that I love you. You know I only ever wanted what’s best for you—to make you a better person.”
I scoffed, a bitter laugh leaving my lips before I could stop it.
“Clark, I’ve been through some shit— real, actual shit. But you?” I shook my head. “You were still one of the worst things to ever happen to me.”
His whole body went taut and his eyes darkened, something dangerous flashing in them.
“You don’t mean that,” he spat, the sharp edge of anger slicing through his words. “I know you love me, and I don’t know why you keep denying it.”
Something inside me snapped.
Maybe it was the fact that he still, after everything, thought he could rewrite the truth. Maybe it was the fact I’d spent so long believing that the sorry excuse of a man in front of me was as good as it would get.
And then, someone else had come along. Someone who had followed me, yes. Lurked in the shadows, yes. Hidden himself away from me, yes. But in the moments we had spent together, he had shown me something Clark never had.
That it wasn’t supposed to feel like this. That someone could want me without trying to break me. That someone could care without wanting to control me. Even if he didn’t want to reveal himself to me, even if he hid it away, he still cared more than anyone ever had before.
I tilted my chin, locking eyes with him. “I don’t love you,” I said, slow and deliberate. “I pity you.”
“Excuse me?”
“I pity you, Clark,” I said, my voice steady despite the rapid pulse bursting through my veins. “You’re cruel. You lash out to make yourself feel bigger, to make yourself feel better. That makes you weak. And I don’t have space in my life for weak men.”
His face contorted, twisting into something uglier, something feral. I knew that look. I’d spent too much of my life shrinking from it, curling in on myself, making myself small. Not this time.
“You’re calling me weak?” His voice pitched higher, and his fists flexed at his sides, knuckles straining.
“Yes, Clark,” I said, forcing the words past the knot in my throat. “Because strong men don’t—”
White-hot pain exploded against the side of my head, so forceful my skull cracked against the damp brick wall behind me. My knees buckled before I could even try to regain my footing—
Another b low.
Stars burst behind my vision, a kaleidoscope of colour before darkness surged in, threatening to pull me under.
“You ungrateful bitch!” His voice was unhinged now, spit flying from his lips. “After everything I fucking did for you—”
Another strike. My stomach lurched. The ground was tilting. Or maybe that was me.
“You think you’re better than me, huh? Think you can talk to me like that?” he yelled as his knee rammed into my ribs.
Sharp, jagged pain tore through me, the air knocked from my lungs in a strangled cry.
“You’re nothing but a nasty, self-righteous slut,” he snarled, spit flecking his lips as his fingers clamped around my jaw, forcing me to look at him.
The metallic tang of blood coated my tongue, thick and warm as I forced myself to stay present, keep my head above the current.
I wasn’t a scared little girl anymore.
I wasn’t going to end up like Evelyn, fading away under the weight of a man’s rage.
My fingers fumbled in my pocket, slick with sweat, searching.
I could fight.
I would fight.
Thank you, Mr. Stalker.
The cool metal pressed into my palm as I clicked the button.
A shrill, piercing wail split the night, so loud it made my own ears ring. Clark flinched, just for a second, but it was all I needed.
I plunged the small blade of my self-defence keyring into his arm.
He cried out as his gaze snapped down to where the metal was now buried into his flesh.
“And you,” I hissed through clenched teeth, twisting it deeper, “are a fucking pathetic excuse of a man. A miserable, rotting, useless sack of shit who needs to crawl—”
His snarl ripped through the alleyway, cutting me off. “Oh, you nasty whore.”
Pain ripped through my ribs as I hit the wet cement with a crack.
Oh, fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Big mistake.
The first kick landed square in my stomach, knocking the air from my lungs in a violent, choking gasp.
Another.
Ribs.
Another.
Hips.
The world blurred, the edges of my vision pulsing in and out as blazing agony flared across every nerve ending.
I tried to curl in on myself, tried to protect something but it was useless. He was a storm, a relentless, raging force.
“ You disgusting little—”
A final, vicious strike to my side sent pain splintering through me like shattering glass. A strangled sound left my throat, something between a sob and a scream.
“LILITH!”
The voice cracked through the air like a gunshot.
Everything stopped except the pounding in my skull, the searing pain licking up my ribs, the sharp sting of cement scraping my cheek.
“Fucking move! Do something! Don’t just film it!”
I cracked my swollen eyes open enough to see Clark’s head snap toward the source of the sound.
The air shifted.
He was ripped back.
He flew, slamming backward against the opposite wall with a force so brutal it sent shockwaves through the alley.
I blinked, dazed, pain lancing through my skull.
Through the haze, I just about made him out.
Towering. Shaking with rage. Chest rising and falling in sharp, uneven breaths as he positioned himself between me and Clark, his body a shield.
Then his fist met Clark’s face.