Chapter 10 Shannen
Shannen
I’ve been here before.
At least it feels that way.
I’m walking barefoot, the pads of my feet grazing something that feels like grass, but softer, almost like velvet. But there’s no light here. I can’t see a damn thing. There should be a moon. There should be stars, something to break up this darkness, but there’s only endless black surrounding me.
I’m not outside. I can’t be. The air is too still, yet the wind finds me anyway, wrapping around my ankles and working its way up my body.
I’m not cold; I should be, but I’m not.
I walk deeper into the void, letting the darkness curl around me, but I don’t flinch. Fear doesn’t live here. Not when I’m never truly alone.
I feel him.
Not his hands.
Not his breath on my neck.
He’s not touching me, but he’s here. Moving through the shadows beside me, living in the corners of my mind and the parts of me that don’t belong to me anymore.
Maybe they never have.
Something is pulsing beneath my skin. A heartbeat. Could be his, could be mine. It’s impossible to tell the difference anymore.
Suddenly, something drops from the nothingness above me, soundless, falling straight into my waiting hands.
It’s a letter, and somehow, it’s the only thing I can see clearly in the darkness.
It’s not addressed to me, but my fingers tremble with a recognition I don’t understand yet as I open it.
Did I write this?
“I hate you. I hate you. I hate you.”
The words repeat down the page like a chant, and my whisper echoes them.
“I hate you…”
At the bottom, written in a thick red smear, there’s one ugly word staring back at me.
LIAR.
It looks like blood. Smells like it too—iron and copper hitting my senses the second I lift it closer to my nose.
Jesus, it is blood.
The darkness behind me solidifies into a wall, hitting my back hard enough to steal my breath. Warm hands slide over my shoulders, across my arms, and wrap around my wrists before gliding back up again.
“Phoenix?”
There’s no answer, but the hands don’t stop moving in slow strokes that shouldn’t hurt, but somehow they make me ache from the inside out. I squeeze my eyes shut because the pain isn’t flesh and blood; it’s deeper, and my body recognizes it.
“Open your eyes, pretty girl.”
“No.”
“Open. Them.”
His hands fall away from my skin like mist, and my eyes slowly open despite every instinct telling me to keep them shut.
He’s there, standing in front of me now—only he’s a silhouette—but I know it’s him.
He stands just far enough away that I can’t reach him.
The only thing breaking up the endless stretch of nothing is the faint outline of his body—more violet than black, like his presence carries its own light.
“Phoenix?”
A sound leaves him, low and muffled, like he’s speaking through water.
I take a step toward him, scared that one wrong move might shatter the moment entirely, but as soon as I do, he steps back.
Panic claws up my throat, and suddenly I’m running.
I’m sprinting so hard my lungs burn, yet he only slips further away, dissolving and fading between every jagged breath I manage to take.
Then he’s just… gone.
Gone.
Gone.
Gone.
The word loops endlessly in my mind, growing less real as my alarm blares like a siren. I fumble for my phone, swipe at it with a groan, and drag my palm down my face.
My head’s a fog of dreams I can’t quite remember—just fragments of darkness and hands that felt too real that left me waking up feeling dazed and confused.
I swing my legs over the bed and plant my feet on the cold floor, elbows on my knees, head in my hands, trying to piece together what the actual fuck is wrong with me.
Because there’s definitely something broken inside, not just off, but wired the wrong way.
It’s been two days since I saw Phoenix at Lawson’s, and now he’s vanished.
Poof.
Gone.
Like he never fucking existed.
No midnight touches.
No shadow-lurking bullshit.
No smart-ass messages just to remind me he’s thinking about me or that he wants me to think about him.
Which, obviously, I do.
I haven’t stopped since the second he walked away from me.
This is what he wants. He wants to get in my head.
The dark little bitch who lives in the back of my mind, the one who sounds too much like him, takes this moment to crawl her smug ass to the surface.
“He never left your head. He’s in you just like you’re in him.”
She’s not wrong, and that’s the worst part because I feel him everywhere.
He’s under my skin. He’s in every breath I take and every twitch of my thighs.
Every time I close my eyes, he’s right fucking there, and all I see is the way he looks at me, like he’s ready to break me, but he’ll keep loving me for it.
By the time I push through the office doors, I’ve almost convinced myself I’m fine.
Betty’s at the front desk, glasses perched on her nose, her eyes lifting the second I walk in.
“For someone who doesn’t have a boyfriend, you’ve got a lovely package waiting for you,” she teases, raising an eyebrow with a small smile that says she’s been dying to tell me this since the second it arrived.
My eyes narrow. “What kind of package?”
“I set it out on your desk. You’ll see.”
The second I open my office door, I’m met by a massive, overcompensating bouquet sitting dead center on my desk—all pinks and yellows and oranges.
It’s way too bright, way too loud, and so not me.
They’re nice, I guess, in that generic, bought-from-the-cute-flower-shop kind of way. But I hate flowers like this, and I can’t lie—the first thing I feel is smug because if these are from Phoenix, then he doesn’t know me at all.
I approach slowly, already mentally drafting a text to tell him I’m allergic to saccharine bullshit when I see the pink card. My name’s printed on the front in a scripted gold font, and I already hate it.
Shannen, thank you for lunch. It was lovely to finally meet you, and I can’t wait to see what you’re going to do for me. Looking forward to the gala. James.
It’s been an hour, and I swear I can barely breathe.
The scent of the flowers is practically strangling me.
I can feel it coating my throat, burning my nose, and making my head feel stuffy every time I inhale.
I’m only keeping them because I’m not a disrespectful asshole.
But I won’t lie, I’m counting down the days until they shrivel up and die so I can toss them out without guilt.
Honestly, I might start turning the air conditioner up just to speed things along.
A knock at the door interrupts my murderous thoughts about the bouquet, and Xander walks in—full charcoal suit and tie, completely oblivious to the concept of casual Friday. I’m pretty sure the guy’s never even heard of jeans.
I’m dressed up too—pencil skirt, blouse, heels—but only because I had no fucking clue what day it was when I dragged myself out of bed this morning.
Dreams: 1, Sleep: 0.
“Morning, Shannen,” he says with a smile as he steps inside. “I sent over the proofs you asked for on the Morrison account. I went with a navy and gold palette.”
“Oh, awesome. Let’s see.”
He sits across from me as I pull up the email and click through the designs for the seafood restaurant, each one featuring deep-navy backgrounds with sleek pale-gold accents.
“Nice flowers,” he says, nodding toward the bouquet and pulling my attention back to the monstrosities taking up too much space in the room.
My eyes lift slowly—death stare. No smile.
He holds up his hands, smirking. “Or not.”
“If you were buying a woman flowers, is this what you’d go for?”
“Probably not. This is the kind of thing I’d buy for my grandma though.”
Perfect.
“Do I give off grandma vibes?”
“I know you’re not actually asking me that.”
I let out a small laugh, shaking my head as I scroll through the next design.
“These are great. Do you have a favorite?”
“Yeah, the third one,” he says. “But I wanted your opinion.”
“They’re all strong,” I tell him honestly. “You could pick any of them, and it would work.”
“Would it be worth developing a couple more so the client has more choice?”
I purse my lips, thinking. “Probably not. Not for this one. Sometimes giving them choices backfires. If we show them what works and why it works, they’ll usually respond well. If they want revisions, that’s when it becomes collaborative, but we need to lead first.”
He stands up, tucking his tablet under one arm. “I’ll move forward with the third and send it back over to you when it’s done.”
“Thank you, Xander.”
It’s been an hour, and all I’ve done is procrastinate like a champ. I’ve been refilling my coffee, replying to emails I don’t care about, and trying to remember whether I’ve eaten anything today. Then, like someone flipped a switch, the ideas start pouring out of me.
The sun’s been down for hours, and I’m still sitting here at the office long after everyone else has headed home.
My back’s aching from being hunched over this desk, and my neck is a little stiff from staring at the screen all day.
The last person I saw on their way out was Hilda, and that must’ve been at least an hour ago.
She finished putting the cleaning supplies away in the closet, then waved goodbye, wrapped up in her oversized winter coat that swallowed her tiny frame whole.
So when the elevator kicks up, and I hear the cables whine as the car rises, something inside me snaps tight.
There shouldn’t be anyone else here.
I shut off my computer screen, giving myself a clearer view of the hallway outside my open door, and… yeah. Not gonna lie. I’m shitting myself just a little.
When the elevator dings and the doors slide open, relief hits me fast. Phoenix steps out—tall, tattooed, and way too fucking tempting—and walks toward me like it’s completely normal for him to know I’m here and not, god forbid, somewhere else in the entire city, like a normal human adult with free will.
Dread settles in my stomach as he gets closer.
No. Not dread.
It’s really hot, sick, addictive anticipation.
I hate the effect he has on me and the way my pulse skyrockets when I know it should freeze.
It drives me out of my mind. But what I really hate is the part of me that wants this man—that’s missed this man.
And he is a man now—a dangerous, obsessive, impossibly beautiful man who could hurt me again without even lifting a finger.
He knocks before pushing the door fully open, and I stare at him like he’s grown a second head.
“You knock now?”
“I’m trying to be polite.”
“Since when?”
He shrugs, stepping inside. “Since now.”
I roll my eyes, flip my screen back on, and pretend to care about the spreadsheet in front of me because it’s easier than looking at him.
Numbers.
Cells.
Projected losses.
Profit margins.
All of it blurs because none of it matters when he’s here, just existing the way he does.
He doesn’t say a word, but his energy is off.
Something feels wrong. I don’t know what it is, but I feel it everywhere, especially in that stupid buried place that still remembers what it felt like to ache for his nearness.
I lift my gaze, and he’s staring straight through me. He’s looking past me and out the glass window as if I’m not even here.
“What’s happened?”
Fuck me, I still care.
I hate that the concern hits me exactly the same way it used to.
He drops into the chair across from me and exhales like he’s been holding that breath in until he finally feels safe enough to let it go. He leans forward, elbows hitting the desk, fingers dragging through his hair as I watch his usual fight drain out of him.
“I went to visit my mom.”