Chapter 29
CHAPTER
TWENTY-NINE
Rett
I ran away from home in eleventh grade, so I never finished high school.
Being underage and having no high school diploma, no money, a serious mistrust of people, and an autoimmune disorder wreaking havoc on my body meant I was basically a walking disaster.
Actually, a limping one. I was consumed a lot by hopelessness, and I wondered why I even bothered if my life was only ever going to be reduced to survival.
For so long, it seemed the entire world was against me, even my own body. I was nothing but an insignificant speck in a world where it was me against everyone, including myself.
Truthfully, these were things I still battled with today.
It did get better after Hiro started stalking me and left me the bag of money.
Without that money, I wouldn’t have been able to walk off the street and into an apartment.
And yes, I knew my apartment was tiny, in the absolute worst part of town, and the building should probably be condemned, but it still represented a fresh start for me—a chance to break out of the life I felt locked in.
Are you wondering why I rented such a rundown place and not something better?
Sure, I could have afforded it—but for how long?
Trust issues, remember? What if I couldn’t find a job?
What if I found a job and couldn’t keep it?
What if I ended up sick and not able to work or make rent?
Having a super nice place only to lose it seemed like a direct route back to where I started.
No thanks.
So I stretched the money Hiro had left me until the bills were practically see-through, and I kept my lifestyle simple because it seemed easier to hold on to. If I lost it all like I had before? Well, there wouldn’t be a lot to lose.
But while the money was instrumental in helping me create a life that was a little easier to survive, it wasn’t the thing I was most grateful for.
What was better than a bag full of money?
The way he treated me. How he cared.
I didn’t have a ton of memories from that first encounter when I didn’t even see his face, but it turns out you don’t have to see something for it to leave a mark.
Those whisps of whispers, his gentle hands, and the way my body unclenched for a little while still echoed inside me like a second heartbeat.
And even though I woke up alone that day, for once, I hadn’t felt lonely.
And then I got to see his face, hear his voice. Feel his touch. I learned that safety wasn’t the absence of fear. It was his presence. So of course I fell fast and hard. After all, my defenses were built for cruelty, not kindness.
Even in his gruff, mysterious way, Hiro was all kindness. That was until he left.
Funny how one man could be both salvation and damnation. How strong must he be to wield both?
I tried to hate him even as I coveted the brief moments we shared. But it turned out my heart was far better at love than hate, and now I understood that he thought his cruelty had been a kindness, his own warped way of protecting me.
Oddly, it only made me love him more.
“Excuse me! Are you even listening to me?” The aggravated yell of the customer on the other end of the call made me gasp.
Shit. I’m supposed to be working. “I-I’m sorry, could you please repeat that, ma’am?”
“Who are you calling ma’am?” the person on the line exclaimed.
“Do I sound like a woman to you?” Obviously, he didn’t want a response because he kept going.
“I know you young people these days are all about freedom or whatever you call it, but I have no problem being what God made me, which is a red-blooded man.”
Oh boy.
“Of course, sir. I’m terribly sorry for misgendering you. It was a mistake as—”
“Mis-what? Christ, there’s a term for everything these days, isn’t there? Forget it. Are you capable of handling this issue, or should I speak to your supervisor?”
A moment of panic gripped my chest because the last time I had to patch a customer through to a supervisor, I got an hour-long lecture about de-escalating the situation and then was stuck in a four-hour session of training videos about retention techniques and call controls.
But the truth? I actually had no idea what this conversation was about.
I was exhausted, had more excitement in the last twenty-four hours than I’d had in the last year, and was trying to wrap my brain around Hiro and his murder locker.
Or, rather, why I didn’t give a crap about Hiro’s murder locker.
Because he cares about you.
Thankfully, my survival instincts kicked in and reminded me I was at work and this was no big deal. Brain fog was a normal occurrence for me. I walked around lost in my own head more than anything else, and I always managed. I just needed to do a little damage control.
“Yes, sir,” I answered, staring at the laptop in front of me. Thank God for recorded calls. I leaned in close, squinting at the words on the screen. “You’re calling because you are having problems connecting to the internet.”
“No. It’s connected. But it’s buffering so bad I might as well turn it off. How’m I supposed to watch the fight tonight if it freezes every other second? I bet a lot of money on tonight’s match.”
“Yes, I can see how that would be very frustrating,” I said, pulling up the manual for resetting the router. I’d done this with customers a thousand times, but I always liked to have the instructions in front of me because I somehow always forgot something.
“Frustrating?” he yelled, and I winced. “What’s frustrating is that you charge me an arm and a leg for this service and then make me pay on top of it just to watch the shit I want to watch. And now you’re trying to make me pay even more to go ad-free!”
“Yes, sir,” I said, only wanting to acknowledge I was still listening.
“After all that, you still don’t have the decency to make sure the channels even work!”
“I’m very sorry for all the trouble, sir. I can walk you through resetting your router and receiver now, and that will hopefully fix the issue.”
“And that’s another thing!” he roared. “Why am I the one having to do your job? You should come out here and fix it yourself.”
My shoulders slumped a little. Usually, I was a lot more resilient when listening to people yell at me. But I really was exhausted, and he was loud.
Should have taken a nap instead of searching for a murder locker.
“Are you there?”
“Yes, sir,” I said, pulling up another screen. “I am more than happy to schedule an appointment for one of our technicians to come out to you and resolve the issues in person. I can even have them change your cable box if you prefer.”
“What will that cost me?”
“There is an automatic service fee of seventy-five dollars, but—”
“Seventy-five dollars! Are you out of your mind? Why would I pay you to fix a problem your equipment caused?”
“I’m happy to talk you through resetting the equipment now. There is no charge for that.”
“Unbelievable,” he muttered. Then he started yelling, “Lynn, can you believe this shit? I told you we should have gotten satellite!”
I heard a woman’s voice somewhere in the background.
Seconds later, he mumbled, “Don’t be telling my wife about those illegal channels I got.”
Oh, Lynn was his wife. Lucky her.
“I can’t see those here on your account, sir,” I replied.
“Of course not, ‘cause they’re illegal. But I know you like to stir up trouble with people.”
“Would you like me to help you with the router?” I asked patiently.
“Well, why else would I be on the phone?”
Sometimes, during moments like these, I thought maybe risking staying with my parents until I graduated high school would have been a better choice. Most jobs were impossible to get without a diploma, and the ones I could get that paid halfway decent were like this.
My headache was back, my eyes burned, and the headset over my ears felt heavy and hot. My fingers were warm and swollen already, and I’d only done half my shift so far.
Gonna be a long night. Hiro will be home soon. Honestly, I was surprised he wasn’t back already. What if he leaves again?
I shoved aside the gloomy, panic-inducing thought. I needed to focus. “Okay, so the first thing you’re going to want to do is go to where your home router is located and unplug it.”
“Fine,” he grumbled into the line and started moving around.
I waited patiently, thankful for the moment of reprieve.
“Lynn!” he roared so loud I jerked back in my seat, hard enough to pull the plug leading to the headset out of the computer. “Where the hell is the damn router?” His voice boomed out of the speakers and filled the dining room.
I glanced guiltily at my plant babies because they had to hear him yell. Before they could be traumatized, I groped toward the floor for the end so I could plug it back in.
As I fumbled, the front door burst open. “Pip, I’m home!”
Startled for the second time, I fell out of the chair, landing in a heap beside it. Quickly, I scurried up, grabbed the cord, and stood, only to bang my head on the underside of the table.
“Ow!” I swore, grabbing the back of my head.
“Pip?” Ghost called over his boots stomping across the floor.
I straightened just as he rounded the table, and he pulled me against him. The headphones slid onto my shoulders when he cupped the back of my head, checking for lumps.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said softly.
I pressed my face between his unzipped leather jacket, into the cotton of his shirt, and inhaled.
I will never get enough of him.
“You okay? Let me see,” he said, trying to pry me out of my safety zone.
“It’s off. Now what?” The man’s voice boomed through the room again, and I stiffened.
Shit. I’d forgotten about him again.
I pulled back and reached for the headphones.
Hiro caught the headset, eyes pinched into narrow slits. “Who is that?”
“A customer,” I whispered, tugging on the device. “I need these.”
His grip on the headset only increased. “I know he ain’t talking to you like that.”