Chapter 17
Angel
I don’t like feeling lost, carrying around a sense of being adrift, but my chest felt nearly caved in when I woke this morning.
Lauren was still asleep beside me, but that was expected with how much she drank last night.
I spent long moments looking over at her, contemplating slitting her throat, but it didn’t take me long to decide that it wasn’t her fault I was so quick to spill my fucking guts after waking only two hours after falling asleep.
There’s nothing quid pro quo about this situation she seems determined to keep putting the two of us in. I don’t owe her anything. I wasn’t forced to make confessions just because she made her own.
I don’t know why I started talking, why I would’ve risked speaking about the shit I went through. She didn’t move, didn’t budge at the sound of my voice, and rather than being relieved, I felt a little disappointed that she didn’t hear me.
That was, of course, in the middle of the night when demons and things like regret seem just a little less dangerous.
With the sunrise comes a new day and a way to shove all that shit back into the bottle.
My secrets are safe. Her drunkenness assures it, but the sun also brought a disgusted sense of vulnerability.
I should’ve fucked her. That would’ve made me feel better. I woke up, my erection straining against the rough texture of the sheets, with her whiskey breath so close to my face I swear I could get secondhand drunk off of it.
And that just pissed me off even more. It’s a level of power she has over me. Some minor control she has with the ability to make me hard just by fucking sleeping.
I went through every ounce of her things. I checked pockets, scrolled through her phone, dug into every corner of her bag.
I found and smashed the fucking AirTag she left in my truck, and I wanted to kick my own ass when I discovered it just sitting in the passenger side door. I bet it thrills the shit out of her that I’ve been so fucking sloppy that she was able to track me so easily, but I put an end to that.
I left her with her shit strewn all over the motel room. There’s no point in hiding the fact that I went through her things. I want her to know what she did last night was incredibly stupid. It left her vulnerable, and she really needs to do better.
I manage to hide my shock when the bell rings above the diner door and she fucking walks in.
It doesn’t take her eyes long to find me tucked in the back corner which gives me visibility to everything that’s going on inside.
She looks miserable, her eyes tight and squinty, face free of any makeup. She’s exhausted. It’s clear in the slightly hunched set of shoulders, in the way each step looks like it’s taking her more effort than she’d like to use.
She’s fucking gorgeous.
She looks used and abused, and I let my gaze drift right back down to her neck, feeling bereft once again that my marks have faded away.
My cock threatens to thicken, a reminder that I could reapply those bruises in the bathroom here while fucking her, daring her to make enough noise for others to run to her rescue.
It won’t happen though.
Hell, this shouldn’t be happening.
I’m on the south side of Lubbock. I only stopped because I was in desperate need of coffee after getting little to no sleep last night.
She doesn’t smile. It seems she doesn’t have the energy to even fake it this morning.
I don’t question how in the hell she found me because this is another mistake I’ve made where she’s concerned.
The visible AirTag was a decoy. I stopped looking when I found it, and it seems that was her plan all along.
There has to be another one in my truck, or she’s somehow managed to put tracking software on my cell phone.
If I were the type of man to issue earned praise, I might do it, but her being in front of me just pisses me off. I wanted to rid myself of her. I wanted the time it was going to take to stop thinking about this bitch, and that’s impossible with her continuing to show up around every fucking turn.
I thought I taught her enough lessons, hurt her badly enough that she would leave, but she’s like an abused fucking dog, crawling back on her stomach, too terrified to wiggle her tail but hopeful there will be kindness in my hands the next time I touch her.
But that’s not true either, is it?
She craves the violence. She wants to be hurt, to be abused.
It’s her penance, her punishment, for her sister being on the receiving end of all of it when they were kids.
It’s how she says sorry to Liana. She lets others abuse her.
I should feel like an asshole for how I’ve treated her. I think most men after hearing her confessions last night would jump at the opportunity to tell her that he’s sorry.
I’m not other men.
I’m not fucking sorry.
What I am is addicted.
I want to hurt her.
I want to taunt her about her pain while fucking her bloody.
Why?
Because it’s giving her exactly what she wants, what she needs.
She comes so fucking hard on my cock when she’s hurting the most.
It’s not my place to worry about how she copes with her fucked-up past. Just like it’s no one else’s business how I cope with mine. We aren’t special. There are more people than anyone could ever know that are struggling with battles. The level of fucked-upness doesn’t even matter.
If she puts herself in a position to be abused, how is it my place to comment? I’m not exactly the fucking poster child for positive mental health.
What’s fucked up is my demons like playing with her demons. We feed each other and that will become so fucking dangerous to both of us. Will I become her father, taking what I need when I want it? Will she become her sister, finally getting enough and plunging a knife in my chest?
My skin itches with the possibilities of finding out.
So am I the asshole for providing that to her or is the sensitive man, the one that feels bad, the asshole?
I choke down the growl at thinking of other men being inside of her.
That little hint of jealousy pisses me off. It’s another sign of her control, of the claws she has in my skin.
I hate her even more for it.
I want to punish her more.
I want more cries, more begging, more tears.
I want to leave her drained and incapable of following me.
I want her fucking gone.
Only the chatter of other patrons float around us.
She orders a cup of coffee, and those are the only words that I hear from her for the better part of an hour.
When I stand, so does she.
When I climb into my truck, so does she.
I don’t say a word.
Despite heading toward home, I know I’d never bring her there. I’m going to have to cut her loose eventually, but doing it right this very second isn’t really a concern for me.
She doesn’t attempt to turn on the radio.
She doesn’t complain when I roll down the window because the scent of her skin is driving me absolutely insane.
She doesn’t try to torture me with small talk like she did before.
It’s as if the woman is a shell of herself, as if getting drunk and laying all her bad shit at my feet left her completely empty and she’s in no rush to get any of it back.
When I have to stop for gas, I find myself waiting to see if she’s going to get back in the truck or wander off again.
As I near Mission, Texas, the place I’ve decided to call home for now, she’s still with me, still silently riding in the passenger seat unexpectantly.
I don’t head to my house. It’s my sanctuary, and I know myself. I could bring her home, fuck her past her telling me to stop, but I’d never find the same peace there I have before. She’d ruin that for me.
Instead of telling her to get the fuck out of my truck, I end up at a local motel just as the sun is fading in the sky.
I don’t ask her to join me or offer to let her stay with me, and when I climb out of the truck, she doesn’t follow me. By the time I make it back out of the front office with my room key, she’s gone.
Without bothering to search my truck for another AirTag, I head into my room, wondering just how long it’ll take her to pop back up.
I’ve thought before, more than once, that she was done with whatever sick game she’s playing with me, only for her to reappear.
I know better than to think we’ve said goodbye.
I’m anxious to get back home so I can use my computer software to find my next job.
I purposely keep an older phone, one without all the bells and whistles in order to prevent people from tracking me, so that means I have to be home with my state-of-the-art firewalls to use facial recognition software that helps me match missing persons with women for sale online.
I learned my lesson about using physical infiltration in a sex trafficking cell to find my client’s loved ones. Doing that landed me in El Salvador.
I guess I have Lauren to thank for forcing my hand toward more modern technology so I don’t find myself once again strapped to a wall.
I’ll never voice that, however. A punishment seems more fitting where she’s concerned.
My shower is quick, and I do my best to ignore the swirl in my stomach when I walk out of the bathroom and she isn’t taking up space in my motel room.
Dinner is up next, and because I refuse to use any form of credit, it means I have to leave the room to find something to eat. After being sequestered to the truck all day, I walk the handful of blocks to the nearest fast-food chain.
I keep my head down but eyes open. I may be in the city that I live, but it would be foolish to think I’m safe here.
With the Mexican border less than twenty miles away, everyone in town has to be aware of their surroundings.
I’m less likely to end up victimized by anyone than, say, a woman would be, but there are always idiots who want to press their luck.
It takes ten minutes longer than it should to get my food, but letting teenagers run businesses seem to be the norm these days.
I know she’s back before I even step inside the motel room.
This woman left the door cracked, uncaring if someone other than me stepped inside with her.
I have no idea why I want to shake her until her brain gets back online when I step inside to discover she’s not only inside, but in the shower and completely vulnerable to any person with the hint of evil inside of them.