Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
NOAH
His breathing is slow and even, his tanned and toned swimmer body curved toward mine in unconscious trust. For someone who is six feet tall, he looks small beside me, breakable in an innocent way.
One hand rests against my chest, his fingers splayed over my heart as if measuring its rhythm.
His thick dark brown hair that’s started to curl from needing a trim lays perfectly across my skin.
I look at his wedding band and the roar of ownership bursts through my blood.
I move my eyes to his face which is peaceful, beautiful, completely unaware.
I zone in on his dark eyelashes and count each lash on each eye.
My vision is like a computer that can decode whatever I see, unlike most people I can hone in on extreme detail.
I have a hyperfocus, in particular when it comes to Chase.
Just like now, I’ve noted his resting heart rate is fifty-five beats per minute. Standard for him when sleeping.
I lie perfectly still, which is a skill I've perfected over years of maintaining control even in vulnerability and analyze the night. Luca.
The memory from the first meeting unfolds with perfect clarity, because I remember everything.
Every detail and every second. My mind doesn't blur or soften trauma the way normal brains do.
It preserves and files away all information like a piece of paper in a filing cabinet. It replays in my head with HD clarity.
We'd been seated at a corner table with a view of the canal, candlelight reflecting off the water, the air thick with the scent of garlic and wine.
Chase had been radiant. He always is when we're in public, animated, charming, drawing eyes without even trying. I'd watched him the way I always do, noting every micro-expression, every gesture, measuring the attention he attracted and determining which of it constituted a threat.
The waiter had been a threat from the moment he approached our table, actually before then, when he had checked us in.
Mid-twenties. Attractive in that mysterious way, dark eyes, olive skin, confident smile.
His name tag read Luca. He'd made eye contact with Chase immediately, held it a fraction too long, let his smile warm into something more than professional courtesy.
The existence of people annoys me to toxic levels, but there are the ones like Luca who have a special place.
I noticed everything. Luca made no attempt to hide his desire to get into Chase’s pants.
Commenting on his eyes, mentioning how lucky I was.
Fucking asshole. Chase had been polite, batted away the compliments as if they were harmless without any intent.
He was more focused on me, just like I had manipulated him to be after I first met him.
My goal was always for me to be the sole purpose of Chase’s life and it had worked out beautifully, but occasionally we would come up against an annoying whore like Luca.
Sometimes it can be friendliness, but I'd seen the way Luca looked at him, even though he was aware we are married.
The way his gaze had lingered on Chase's mouth, his throat, the elegant line of his neck.
Unacceptable. I do have the intelligence that it would be impossible for me to kill every person in sight that breathes near Chase, which I would do if it was possible, but I’m not at home where I have my country house that holds a never ending amount of dead bodies congealed in an acid drum.
But there are times when fuckheads like Luca appear and there is no choice. Exceptions are made.
Back at the hotel, I'd fucked Chase with a deep intensity, needing to reclaim every inch of his skin Luca had run his disgusting eyes over. As always, Chase had been pliant and eager beneath me, gasping my name, clinging to me with desperate need, the way I had molded him to become.
Afterward, I'd faked being asleep as I did most nights. Naive Chase thought he knew me so well in every way, but he didn’t know that I faked sleep, knowing he was watching me, the watching was my job.
I'd held him until his breathing slowed and deepened into sleep.
I'd waited another thirty minutes to be certain, monitoring his breathing, the rhythm of his heartbeat against my chest, the complete relaxation of his body that indicated deep REM sleep.
After I'd extracted myself carefully, dressed in black, I gathered my tools.
Gloves. Knife. Phone. Ski mask. All the instruments of my particular craft.
I would never leave Chase alone while he was awake.
Never. The thought of him vulnerable, unprotected and exposed to potential threats while conscious is intolerable.
But sleep is different. In sleep, he's safe in our locked room, unaware, and I can use those hours to eliminate the fuckers that circle him during waking hours.
The streets of Venice at 2am are a labyrinth of shadows and silence. I'd walked them with purpose, memorizing routes, identifying camera placements, finding the blind spots where observation could occur undetected.
I'd known where Luca worked. Now I needed to know where he lived.
I'd positioned myself across from Osteria della Luna’s service entrance and waited.
At 2:14am, Luca had emerged from the exit with his earbuds in, phone glowing in his hand, completely unaware.
He'd been texting someone, his attention absorbed by the screen.
I'd followed at a distance. He'd walked through the narrow streets, his pace was relaxed and unhurried.
I'd watched from across the campo as he'd climbed the stairs to the third floor. It didn’t take long for a light to turn on in a corner apartment. The building was old, the lock on the main entrance simple. No security cameras visible.
I'd waited thirty minutes, then approached.
The main entrance lock was a basic pin tumbler and it had taken me forty-five seconds to pick it.
The stairwell smelled like cooking oil and old stone, a building with many memories.
I'd climbed to the third floor, my footsteps silent before I examined Luca's door, which matched the outdoor position of the light. Apartment 3C.
It was another simple lock with no deadbolt or security chain visible from the gap in the door.
I didn’t enter. Not yet. Instead, I'd memorized the layout of the door's position relative to the stairs, the apartment across the hall (dark, possibly vacant), the fire escape access at the end of the corridor.
Then I'd returned to the hotel.
Chase was awake, looking for me, no doubt his soul even asleep noticed my disappearance.
Watching his face as he fought with himself whether he truly wanted to know my plans amused me.
This relationship had turned out much better than I even thought it would.
I always planned for him to be under my total submission, to be co-dependent and his whole life to be about me.
I was not expecting his slow demise into my world.
I may not understand why he gets offended or thinks I patronize him, but I can see the darkness slowly creeping in.
He wants to know what I do but he is too scared to hear it, because then it is real.
Because then the next step is that he will want to see.
The fight is leaving him as the parts of the “good” guy start to leave him day by day.
He will see the world in its harsh and raw truth.
The evil that it holds. It will be majestic.
After encouraging him back to bed, I watch him as he falls asleep. I smile to myself that the full process of breaking and re-building Chase is nearly over, his evolution complete.
The next evening, we'd returned to Osteria della Luna. Chase had been surprised by my suggestion, but he hadn't objected even though I could tell by the fidgeting of his hands he was maybe anxious. He never objects because he trusts my decisions, the management of our lives.
Luca's face had lit up when he'd seen us, his attention immediately focusing on Chase. Throughout dinner, I'd watched him like a hawk. I watched the way he moved. His patterns. How often he checked on our table versus others. The route he took to and from the kitchen.
I'd followed Luca again that night. Same route. Same apartment building.
The main entrance lock had yielded in under a minute. The stairwell had been dark, silent. At Luca's door, I'd paused and listened. Distant music sounds from inside, but no voices. He lived alone.
I'd picked the lock and it had taken longer than the main entrance, ninety seconds, maybe two minutes. The mechanism was older, more worn. But eventually, the pins had aligned and the lock had turned.
I slowly opened the door, waited for any sound of movement but all I could hear was music from the bedroom and the sound of running water from the bathroom where Luca must have been showering.
I only stepped over the threshold to scan the apartment.
I'd needed to see the interior layout and understand the space and plan the approach.
Back at the hotel, Chase was in bed, pretending to be asleep. I could tell with how his chest moved. Chase still didn’t understand that I knew every single thing about his body and movement. I had trained myself and continue to learn to this day about every part of him.
The next night, I'd waited until Chase’s breathing had slowed and deepened into sleep.
Then I'd dressed in my dark clothes consisting of black jeans, long-sleeved shirt, thin gloves and my new purchase of soft-soled shoes.
I'd gathered my tools in a backpack: lock picks, a folding knife with a four-inch blade, plastic sheeting, cleaning supplies, and of course my camera phone. Everything I needed.