Chapter Forty-Three
J ULIAN
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I SLIPPED MY SHOES back on. I snatched up my keys from the floor where I’d dropped them, then left the house. My phone rang again. I stared at the screen. It wasn’t her. Fuck! I leaned back in the driver’s seat, letting my head fall against the headrest, and exhaled slowly. They weren’t going to stop calling. Not tonight. Not on my birthday. I lifted my phone again and hit call. It rang once before he answered.
“Julian,” Dad started.
“I’m not coming,” I said before he could launch into a lecture on being punctual. “I’ve got... plans.”
He went silent for a beat. Then asked, “Is it a girl?”
I should’ve said yes. Let him believe it was some random club bimbo I met at the bar. But it wasn’t. Stefanie wasn’t a girl. She was a woman . My woman, even if she didn’t claim me out loud. Not yet.
“No,” I said simply.
“Then it’s not important. Come home now, son.”
I shook my head. “Good night, Dad. I love you and Mom. Thanks for the party.”
I ended the call and tossed the phone into the passenger seat. I didn’t want a party. Tonight I had to see her. I had to talk to her. I had to be with the woman who’d been dodging my calls for far too long.
I was feeling the effects of the whiskey. I shouldn’t have driven, but that didn’t stop me. I needed to see her. When I arrived, I noticed her porch light was off. I parked crooked in her driveway and stumbled to her door.
I knocked once. Waited. Knocked again, a little louder. No answer. I knocked a third time, pressing my forehead against the door. Still nothing. Fuck. I wondered if she’d changed the code. Surely, she had.
My fingers hovered over the panel. It wouldn’t hurt to try. I tapped in those four digits I’d memorized the day she first trusted me enough to give them to me. My thumb hovered over the Enter key.
Please, be the same, and please don’t have the deadbolt locked.
I pressed Enter. Click . The keypad turned green. I sighed as the sound damn near brought tears to my eyes. I pushed the door open and slipped inside, locking it behind me. Now, this, this felt like home. The lights were off and I didn’t hear her moving around.
“Stefanie,” I called out as I disarmed the alarm system, the keypad beeping to let her know her front door had been opened. “It’s me,” I told the machine as I punched in the code, words slurring.
Once I was done, I moved through the house quietly. The living room was empty. So was the kitchen. I headed to her bedroom. The door creaked open as I pushed it and entered the room. There she was, lying on her side.
There was a half-empty bottle of whiskey on her nightstand. Was she trying to drink away the pain like me? She stirred. Damn. I’d woken her up. She rubbed her eyes, then blinked, staring at me. Our gazes met, and she whispered my name.
“Julian.”
That was all it took. All the anger I’d built up, all the frustration from being ignored, gone with one whispered word from the woman I craved so fucking much. She reached for me, arms stretching out like she needed me the way I needed her, and I walked right into that pull like a man possessed.
I kicked off my shoes, peeled off my jacket, and climbed into her bed without a word. I wrapped my arms around her and breathed in her scent. She smelled like home, like heaven, like everything I’d been missing these past weeks. She buried her face in my neck and inhaled me like I was oxygen.
“Happy birthday,” she whispered.
She remembered. That was the only present I needed.
“Sorry, I didn’t get you a present or even a cake,” she told me.
“I don’t want cake. I want a taste of you.”
She pulled back to stare at me. “Taste me then, Julian.”
I didn’t care if it was the liquor. I didn’t care if it was wrong of me to enter her home the way I had. All I cared about was the woman in my arms, the woman whose taste I needed on my tongue. I kissed her deeply, then proceeded to trail kisses down her neck.
“How does it feel to be thirty?” she whispered.
“I don’t know yet. I just turned twenty-nine.”
“Hmmm,” was all she said as I pushed her panties to the side and licked the icing from the only cake I craved. Hers .
That night wasn’t rushed. It wasn’t frantic or wild. That night, we made slow, sweet, passionate love. It was everything . Her lips on mine. My fingers in her hair. Her legs wrapped around me as she slowly ground against me.
Her lips against my throat as she left her mark on me. My cock buried deep in her pussy until I filled her with my cum. It was perfect. It was what we both needed. I didn’t miss the tears in her eyes. And I wasn’t too drunk to know that I had tears in my eyes also.
We fell asleep wrapped in each other’s arms, right where we were supposed to be. Together. But morning arrived, bringing with it a conversation I hadn’t wanted to have. Morning sunlight punched through the curtains, waking me up.
Groaning, I felt around, feeling for Stefanie. The bed beside me was empty. I rubbed my eyes, still dazed from the night before. Then she spoke, and I heard the anger in her voice.
“Julian, wake the fuck up.”
I blinked, propping myself up on my elbow. Stefanie stood at the edge of the bed, holding my clothes in a ball, face twisted with rage. Shit! What had I done now?
“Baby,” I started.
“No. Don’t you baby me,” she snapped. “You lied to me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You told me you were twenty-nine when we met,” she said, throwing my pants at me. “Last night, you said you were turning twenty-nine. Turning .”
Oh. Shit.
“Stefanie, I...” Shit . “I knew you were concerned about my age, so I said I was twenty-nine already. But it doesn’t matter. I mean, I’m twenty-nine. It changes nothing.”
“It means I’m not ten years older than you. I’m eleven years older than you, Julian!” she shouted, hands shaking. “I’ll be forty soon.”
“It’s just one more year...” I started.
“Get out.”
“I didn’t lie. I just...”
“You lied ,” she repeated, eyes glossy with unshed tears. “You lied , Julian.”
I stood, reaching for her. “Stef...”
“Don’t,” she snapped, stepping back, chest heaving. “Just get your shit and get out of my damn house.”
I stood there, bare-chested, frozen, watching the woman I loved fall apart. I wanted to fix it. I wanted to take her into my arms and make her understand I hadn’t meant to hurt her. It was just one year. But she’d already turned her back.
“Don’t make me ask again,” she whispered.
Fuck . I dressed in silence, realizing I’d only made things worse and made the bridge between us even longer.
“I love you more today than I did yesterday,” I told her. “And I’ll love you more tomorrow than I do today. My love for you will only grow stronger whether we’re together or apart. I can’t turn it off, Stefanie. I can’t make it go away. It’s here to stay. And I’m not letting you go. You need space right now because you’re upset. And you have every right to be. I lied. And I’m sorry. I had plenty of chances to come clean, and I didn’t. I wanted to wait until you said you loved me back. I’m still waiting for you to say those words because I know you feel them. I see it in your eyes. I feel it in your touch. I’ll leave. But I’m coming home soon. You are mine, Stefanie Adams. So don’t think for a second that my leaving means I’m letting you go. I’d die before that happened.”
I turned and left her bedroom. Tears trailed down my cheeks as I walked to the front door. She’d already turned the alarm off. She was ready for me to go. Fuck! I left her house, leaving my heart behind. I’d be back to get it.
For now, she could hold on to it for me.
***
A FEW WEEKS LATER. ..
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I COULDN’T BE THERE with her. I couldn’t watch her from the bear cam. But at least I could watch her house from the camera I’d posted on her light pole. I told myself this wasn’t an obsession. This wasn’t some form of insanity.
It was protection. Strategy. Preventative maintenance, if you will. I was just a man doing what needed to be done to protect the woman he loved. So yeah, I watched. Every night, I tapped into her feed from my laptop.
I sat there with my drink, monitoring her front porch and her driveway. Making sure no strange men showed up. Making sure Hudson didn’t show up. I was still looking for that motherfucker.
He’d vanished, and that didn’t sit right with me. There hadn’t been one sighting of the bitch. But I knew he was too obsessed with Stefanie to just let her go. So, I watched her house and I waited. If he showed up, I’d be ready.
Tonight, the street was empty, like all the other nights so far. The porch light flickered like it had been doing for days. The damn bulb needed replacing. I wanted to do it. But if I went over there, I wouldn’t be able to stop at just changing the bulb.
I’d need to see her. If she didn’t change the damn thing by Monday, I was going over there. I was about to pour another glass when I caught movement outside her house. A car with lights off was creeping toward Stefanie’s house.
It stopped at the curb, and the driver’s side door opened. A man stepped out wearing a dark hoodie and dark jeans, his shoulders hunched, his walk stiff as he approached her house. Fuck! I grabbed my keys and phone.
I called Stefanie. She didn’t answer. I tried again. Still nothing. Fuck! This wasn’t the time for her to be ignoring me.
“Pick up the phone,” I muttered under my breath as I slid into my car.
I pulled up the camera feed on my phone just as the man walked straight up to her front door and stood there, as still as a damn statue. I sped down the road, watching him, eyes darting from the road to my phone, then back to the road.
For a long time, he just stood there, hands in his pockets, not making a move. What the fuck did he want? I called Stefanie again. Still no answer. Fuck! Then he moved around the side of the house. My stomach dropped as he disappeared around the back.
“Fuck,” I growled, slamming my palm against the steering wheel.
I felt useless as hell. I couldn’t see what he was doing back there. If he broke in... if he hurt her... shit ! I called her phone again. This time, when she didn’t answer, I left a voicemail.
“Stefanie, call me back right fucking now. I’m not doing this with you tonight. Something’s happening at your house, and if I don’t hear from you soon, I’m going to break your fucking door down.”
I ended the call. I was going well above the speed limit, but I didn’t give a fuck. I took every turn fast, cutting corners like the laws didn’t exist. When I pulled up to the stop sign near her block, the camera updated.
The guy was back in frame. He was walking to the car again. There wasn’t anything in his hands. Had he tried to break in and failed? He got into his car and cranked it up. Then he drove off.
I was close enough now to see him pulling away from the curb. I stepped on the gas and took off after him, gripping the wheel tight enough to split the leather. I caught up within two blocks.
I pulled up beside him, riding close enough that if I swerved even a little, I’d scrape his door. I wanted him to know it was me. I wanted him to see my fucking face. He glanced at me for half a second before cutting right again, trying to shake me.
But I’d seen his face. Even with his hoodie pulled low, I knew it was Hudson fucking Howard. The bitch I should’ve been killed. He pulled off, putting some distance between us. I stayed on him like a shadow, matching every turn he made.
He sped up, so did I. He swerved. I followed. He took a fast left. I whipped around the corner, tires squealing. When we neared the bend near the trees, I saw my chance to put an end to this chase.
When he sped around the corner, I pulled up beside him and turned into his lane. He panicked. His tires screeched as he ran off the road, kicking up dirt and gravel before his car spun off into the ditch and came to a violent stop inches from a thick oak tree.
I braked hard and slid to a stop across the road. My engine ticked as I stepped out into the night. The air was cool, still, and the only sound besides my breathing was a distant dog barking somewhere down the block.
I walked toward the wreck, mentally noting that I needed to call the cleanup crew to get rid of his car. The driver’s door opened. Hudson climbed out, struggling, favoring one leg as if it hurt just to stand. When our gazes met, he started shaking his head. I nodded.
“You’ve got some fucking nerve,” I said, rolling up my sleeves as I walked toward him. “Showing up at her house like I didn’t already warn you to stay the fuck away from my woman.”
He turned to run, but didn’t get far. His limp slowed him down. Every step looked painful. I let him run for a second, just long enough to enjoy the hope he felt. I could see the desperation in his stride.
He actually thought he had a chance. Fuck that! I closed the distance and grabbed the back of his hoodie. I yanked him down hard, slamming him into the dirt. I stood over him, fists clenched, heart racing.
“I told you to stay away from her,” I said.
He looked up at me, blood already trickling from his mouth, probably from the wreck. For a second, I saw fear crack through his cocky shell. Then he smiled. That disgusting, arrogant smile.
“She belongs to me,” he said, breathless and grinning. “I’ve worked too hard to let her go without at least fucking her once.”
That was the last thing he said before I snapped. My fist cracked against his jaw. His head bounced off the ground. I hit him again and felt cartilage shift under my knuckles. Blood sprayed from his nose.
The third punch split his lip wide open. I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. He swung at me, weakly. Sloppy. It caught the edge of my shoulder. I drove my knee into his stomach, and he folded like a piece of paper.
“You think this is a fucking joke?” I growled, grabbing his collar and yanking him to his feet. “You think you can stalk her, harass her, threaten her, and continue living as if nothing ever happened?”
I slammed him against a nearby tree so hard the bark cracked.
“She will never be yours,” I roared.
My breath came fast. Rage flooded my bloodstream. I thought about his connection to her ex-husband as I punched him again. This bastard had known her ex was hurting her, physically and emotionally.
Yet, he’d pretended to be her friend, even years after her ex died. He’d known the woman Stefanie was caring for was her ex’s mistress. He’d known her ex was planning to leave her. All he was worried about was fucking her.
That was never going to happen. This motherfucker was going to die tonight. I needed to make him suffer, though. He didn’t deserve a fast death. This bitch deserved to be tortured for stalking my woman.
“I’m going to take my time with you,” I muttered, dragging him through the grass toward my car.
“Let me go,” he whimpered, trying to reach for my hands.
“I’ll let you go soon. To hell,” I told him.
He spat blood, tried to roll his shoulder, and resist. But he wasn’t escaping my hold. When I reached my car, I popped my trunk, shoved him inside, and slammed it shut. Then I got behind the wheel, hands stained with his blood, and drove. I knew a place where I could torture this motherfucker to my heart’s content. Cattaneo’s Casino and Resort.
I was taking this motherfucker to the basement.