Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Berkleigh
With a snarl that would scare away the most dangerous predator, Tanner reaches up and grips my forearm. His other hand is still clutching onto the branch that saved his life, and as I try to heave him upward, I realize that this probably wasn’t one of my best ideas.
“Wait!” I have nothing to leverage against, nothing holding me in this spot, and if he keeps pulling then I’m going down with him. “Give me a second.” What for, I have no clue. I was living my best badass life and this seemed like the right thing to do.
“Yeah, no problem. I’ll just hang around here until you’re ready.
” His tone doesn’t match his words and he continues before I can get a word out.
“Plant your feet and fall back. Put all your body weight into it right the fuck now or the car that is currently on fire is going to blow us both up.” Digging his own feet into the rock wall as I obey his instruction, he uses the leverage to pull himself up with the help of me and the branch.
He gets far enough to claw at the earth as I scramble backward, almost horizontal at this point, but I refuse to let go.
I may not have thought this through, but it was impossible to do otherwise.
The crash, the sound of metal crunching, I had to come back.
A new, much darker part of me feels like it would have been Karma playing her hand if Tanner died.
I killed one bully…why not be responsible for the death of another?
But that same dark part of me would have been devastated, broken, and I would have sought revenge on every cop I ever saw again.
I don’t want Tanner to die. I do want some answers, an explanation maybe, or even a simple conversation about why he became an asshole, and I’ll only be able to get that if he’s still alive.
That’s absolutely the singular reason I want him around…
Who am I kidding? I’ve fallen harder than that car went into the ravine and I’m just as fucked.
“Why the fuck did you come back?” Tanner finally gets himself to safety and I fall on my ass as he lets my arm go.
“You said you’d be careful. Dangling from a branch over a ravine after driving a car off it isn’t being careful.
” Standing, I dust off my jeans and pay very close attention to every speck of dirt, picking it off meticulously and avoiding eye contact.
If I look at him, I don’t know how I’ll react now that the adrenaline of the situation is beginning to wear off.
“And you said you’d go back to the cabin, so I guess we both lied.”
An explosion echoes through the trees and makes me jump, a sharp squeal escaping from my throat at the same time, and before I can even move, Tanner is wrapped around me, shielding me from…the world?
Total darkness consumes me in this little cocoon he’s created full of warmth and safety, just as reality takes a giant bite out of my ass.
This is the second time I nearly died, all because of a man who thinks he can take what he wants.
That could be me in the ravine, my body burning in the wreckage, and Tanner just literally risked his own life to save mine.
I’ve lived a good life, I’ve been a good person, why is the world trying to fuck me dry?
Maybe I’m wrong and I haven’t been good.
My decisions have been pretty selfish and self preserving.
I just killed someone, for fuck sake, because she bullied me.
Sure, it was a little more than that, but the bullying was the crux of it.
The world has given me Tanner like, look what you could’ve had all this time if you weren’t such a whiny bitch. And now it’s ready to rip it all away from me again, tearing me apart in the process.
I guess this is everything I deserve.
“Shh, it’s okay. I’ve got you.” He’s stroking my hair back from my face, his thumbs wiping away fat tears I hadn’t realized were rolling down my cheeks.
I blink a few times and open my eyes, the warmth of his embrace not entirely gone, but it’s probably for the best.
“There she is.” He kisses my damp lips, claiming a piece of my soul with every second he lingers. “That voice in your head is a liar. You’re not a bad person.”
Did I think out loud?
“You killed someone today, Berkleigh. It’s a big fucking deal. Normal people should freak out. Although, it took you long enough.” He chuckles and kisses me again. “Look, Taylor Frey deserved nothing less than what she got. End of story.”
A nod is about all I can muster in this moment, and I think he gets it. My internal monologue is having a whole freak out about literally everything. It’s like a system shutdown is happening, my declining adrenaline that was fueling me almost sitting on empty after the explosion.
“Wrap your arms around my neck. I’m gonna take you home, Sweet Bee.” He stands with me in his arms and lifts me like I’m weightless, but my heart begins beating rapidly at just the thought of going home.
I haven’t been there since that night. I can’t.
Shaking my head, I attempt to get down, words of explanation failing me, but he must sense what my panic is about because he refuses to let me go.
“Not your home. My home. Home, home.”
My panic eases and I nod again, completely at his mercy. I feel like a small child in his arms, one desperate for comfort that he gives all too easily. I both love and hate it.
The drive home goes by in a blur of lights reflecting off the windows of the buildings, the rumble of the engine and the music from the stereo melding into something I can’t even begin to fixate on. I don’t even care that Tanner is driving my car.
This birthday has been a mixture of emotions I didn’t think were possible, but I’m ready for it to be over.
I must have fallen asleep because I’m no longer in my car.
A blanket is being carefully placed over my still fully-clothed body, before Tanner’s scent wraps itself around me along with his carefully placed arm across my waist. Turning to nestle into him, I don’t even open my eyes as I make myself comfortable.
One of his arms is now beneath me, my head on his bare chest, and I breathe him in as I drift back off to sleep.
A loud bang makes me shoot up from the bed, immediately regretting it when I have to pause because of a head rush.
Beside me, instead of finding Tanner lying there, the space is empty.
Cold. I tell myself it’s fine. The bang wasn’t a gunshot, I’d know that sound anywhere after the last few weeks of training, but I can’t help the small drop of panic working its way through my system.
I pick up my cell from the bedside table and realize it’s dead, so I leave it on the mattress as I stand, both happy and slightly disgusted that I’m still fully dressed.
Ugh, I should have a shower and get changed, but my curiosity is winning over everything else.
Leaving Tanner’s minimalistic bedroom, I head downstairs, expecting to hear sounds coming from the kitchen.
It’s silent…nada…
I search the rest of the house to no avail. It’s empty. I’m alone.
This is the first time I’ve been alone in longer than I can remember.
The unmistakable sound of a motorcycle engine roars to life from the garage and I rush toward the front door. I’m just in time to watch Tanner ride away with no explanation. Not that I need an explanation, of course, but it would’ve been nice to know he was planning on leaving me here by myself.
With a trembling sigh, I lift my chin and go back inside the house, locking the door behind me.
My next job is checking the locks on any other doors and all of the windows…
all fine. Feeling a little more relaxed, I head upstairs and take a quick shower.
I briefly eyed the bathtub because a long soak would be heavenly, but I talked myself out of it.
I don’t have any of my bath oils here and the fear of entering my own home wins out over bath-time.
Finished in the bathroom, I brush then run my fingers through my short strands.
It won’t take long to dry, and while the spray of water beat down on me in the shower I decided I could use this opportunity to snoop.
Tanner could be gone for ten more minutes, an hour…
I have no idea—about the length of his absence or his occupation. How he makes his living.
I know he used to be in the military, he joined during the summer after we finished high school, but I don’t know why he left, exactly when he left, or what he does now.
I could ask him, but he’s such a closed book.
He’ll probably deflect my questions with his masterful tongue or his magical dick and me being me… I’ll let him.
He makes me both strong and weak all at the same time and it’s confusing.
The place I really want to go is inside the room he told me was off limits.
I mean, really, if he hadn’t said anything then I wouldn’t be so interested, but it was like the Beauty and the Beast movie when the Beast tells Belle that she’s not allowed in the West Wing…
where did she go? To the West Wing, of course.
I’m not surprised to find the door locked, but there is a keypad. A bit fancy, if you ask me, but it also makes me more curious. What is he hiding behind that door?
Purely for shits and giggles, because my chances of guessing the right code are sitting at around 1%, I try his birthday.
Nope. I’ll try one more. Trying three times feels too dangerous, and I can just imagine the veins in his neck bulging if he gets locked out because of me getting his code wrong multiple times.
Two times, though, is perfectly acceptable.
Fuck it…I try the date he and his parents moved in, the first day we spoke and became instant best friends. It’s been my own password since before he ghosted me and became the asshole he is today, and as a creature of habit, I have never used anything else.
Holy shit, it works! The keypad turns green as the door clicks open and I step inside.
I don’t know what I expected to find, but it looks like any normal office to me.
A desk set up with three large screens, a comfortable rolling chair—black leather, obviously—and a lot of hard drives on the shelves.
Nothing out of the ordinary, so why would he specifically give me a rule to stay out of here?
I nudge the computer mouse because if I’m gonna snoop, I should snoop properly, but as soon as I see what is on those screens, I wish I hadn’t. One of the outer screens is split into four images…four images of my house. My living room, my kitchen, my back yard, my porch.
Clicking a folder with my name on it from the center screen, my eyes widen further when I spot one of the thumbnails.
That’s my bedroom!
I open the file and…
Oh, God. My stomach drops and I feel sick.
How long has he been watching me?
Just looking at the image of my bed on that screen makes me want to run far far away from here. Not just my bed, but me on my bed, with my dildo. Suddenly, the whole room feels heavy, thick, suffocating.
Has he been using me for some kind of twisted game? It’s all beginning to feel a little like high school, and with the very real memory of literally killing one of my high school demons, yeah…
I have to leave. I don’t want to stick around and ask questions. It feels like too much on top of everything else.
Rushing down the stairs, I find my car keys in a bowl by the front door.
I grab them and head out, wasting no time on thinking about any consequences to this.
My mom and dad’s house will be empty with them being on a cruise.
I can go there, have a few days to try and work my own mind out, then I’ll come back and let Tanner try and explain his damned self.
Maybe. Because if his friendliness and help have all been a part of something I’m oblivious to, it could break me.
I’m not equipped to deal with all of this, despite my education, and I think the hole I’ve been digging for myself with the let’s-do-Karma’s-job crap is about to cave in on me.
I’ll be fine though…
Yeah…totally fine.