by Alex Grayson
“I know I hurt you, Beautiful,” he whispers. I open my mouth to yell at him again, but snap it shut when he leans down so close, only an inch separates our lips. “It fucking kills me knowing that. A huge weight sits right on my chest, knowing I did that to you. But you’re going to listen to what I have to say. I’m not finished with my story, and I’d rather get everything out in the open now so we can get back to the good parts.”
“It doesn’t matter anymore,” I grit out between clenched teeth. “Nothing you have to say matters. You lied to me, deceived me, and tricked me in to your bed. NOW GET! THE FUCK! OFF ME!”
My blood boils, and I yank my wrists as hard as I can and grunt as I buck my hips. I do this for several minutes, and it does me not one damn bit of good. The only thing I manage to do is make my wrists sore and, if the hard ridge against my belly is anything to go by, arouse the asshole.
I’m panting and out of breath when I sag back against the bed.
“Are you done?” he asks, looking amused. His enjoyment fades when he sees my grimace of pain, so he adjusts his hold on my wrists. Raw pain comes across his face when he looks up and sees what I’m sure are red marks.
“Fuck,” he mutters and brings my hands back down to inspect them. He lightly runs his fingers over the rawness he caused. “Will you please just listen to me?” he asks, his voice soft but husky, like he’s trying to hold his emotions in.
“I don’t really have a choice, do I?” I ask with bitterness.
“No. I need you to know everything,” he murmurs, still rubbing and looking at my sore wrists.
As much as I don’t want to hear it, it looks like he won’t give up until he tells me what he wants me to know. If hearing him out is the only way to get him to leave me alone, then that’s what I’ll do.
“Whatever. But can you get off of me first?”
“No,” he replies simply, sending my hackles rising again. “You’re going to hate me even more by the time I get done talking. I’d rather stay here for when you freak out again so I can finish.”
Warning bells start going off in my head. What else could there be? He’s been practically stalking me for a year, been following me around for almost as long. Knew where I lived from the beginning. Orchestrated a job interview so I would work for him. Sending me flowers for months. Found out and then followed me on a date with a criminal. Slept with me while holding onto all these secrets, and has lied to me over and over again. How much worse can it get? I get the sense I haven’t even heard the half of it.
When I stay silent, he deems that as permission to continue. And what he says next rocks my world, flips it over, sends it spiraling, and completely freaks me the fuck out.
“When I left after following you that first day, I went straight home and did an extensive background check on you. My need to know more about you was unlike anything I had ever felt before. It literally took over every part of my life. I went back to your house the next day because I needed to see you again. I needed to know if that need was just as strong as the day before. I sat out there for hours, waiting on you to come to a window or step outside. When you finally did, the need I felt the day before was obliterated by the need I felt right then. It had only gotten stronger. I knew it wasn’t going to go away. It was uncontrollable.”
He stops for a minute, his eyes flickering back and forth between mine. He closes his eyes for a brief second, pulls in a lungful of air, and releases it at the same time he opens them again.
“A good friend of mine owns a security firm. I had him hook me up with high-tech cameras that were inconspicuous. When I went back to your house the next day, while you were out, I broke in and placed them in each room, except the bathroom.”
Before he even has the words all the way out, I’m frantically trying to get away from him again. I shove with all my strength against his hard chest, but he lays his weight there, pinning my arms to my sides with his legs.
“Stop it!” he demands. “You’re going to hurt yourself.”
“You sick bastard!” I shriek, trying everything I can to get away from him. He grunts when I pinch the ever-loving hell out of his side, but he just pushes my hands so the tips of my fingers are shoved underneath the bottom of my thighs, affectively trapping me.
“Please,” he whispers brokenly and lays his forehead against mine. I turn my face away and his head lands against my temple. His breath fans over my ear as he breathes heavily. “Just let me finish, and I’ll let you go. I need you to know everything first.”
Knowing it’s useless, I lay there, not saying anything, feeling sick to my stomach knowing he’s seen me at my most vulnerable moments. Unbeknownst to me, for the last year, my privacy has been stripped from me. I feel violated and used.
“I also put a tracking device on your car.” I close my eyes and feel a tear fall down my cheek. He keeps his head against my temple as he continues. “I have no idea why I felt the need to watch you and to know where you were all the time, but it wasn’t something I could control. Maybe I was just doing it to protect you, because the thought of something happening to you had my heart feeling like it was being splintered into a million pieces. Maybe my mind is just warped, I don’t know. I just knew I had to watch you, had to see you any time I wanted. Had to know where you were at all times.
“I would stand at your bedroom window and watch you,” he whispers. Revulsion slithers in when I think about prancing around my room naked, unknowingly baring myself. “My day didn’t start until I saw you at work, or watched you from my computer or phone. Weekends were the worst for me because I was stuck watching you on camera. I had to wait until it got dark to watch you from your window.” He stops again for a brief second. “Sometimes, I would break in and watch you sleep,” he murmurs.
I jerk with that. My heart breaks further and the feeling of betrayal grows.
“As much as I wanted to, I never touched you beyond pushing your hair back from your face. I needed to see your face. You looked so peaceful and sweet while you slept.”
I start to tremble when a new emotion starts to form. An emotion I never thought I would feel toward Asher.
Fear.
Fear of what he could have possibly done to me while I slept. Fear of what he could do to me right now. I’m vulnerable and I know it. Asher could literally do anything he wanted to me right now and there’s not a damn thing I can do to stop it. And obviously, his limits are very low. He’s shown he’s willing to do just about anything. Does that include hurting me? I don’t want to think Asher is capable of that—he’s never hurt me physically before—but it’s obvious I don’t know him as well as I thought I did.
I tremble as I lay beneath him. He still has his forehead against my temple. Tears silently trickle from my eyes and onto the bed. The pain in my chest hurts worse than anything I’ve ever felt before. It hurts worse than when my mom and dad died. Worse than when I found Grant cheating on me. It feels like my heart will never be whole again.
I close my eyes and whimper when I feel Asher’s fingers on my cheek, wiping away my tears. His voice is hoarse when he continues to talk, breaking my heart and making me fear him all the more.
“The reason I’m so good at my job is because I used to hack into computers. I started when I was eight years old. I never came across a system I couldn’t break into. Anyway, I found the dating site you were using and broke into their database. All the dates you went on, I orchestrated because I knew they would turn out badly. To me, you were already mine, so I wasn’t going to allow some man to come in and take you away before I had a chance to move in myself.”
I flinch and try to hold back my sob, but it slips free. The more he reveals, the more pain I feel. I can’t handle much more before I completely break down. I focus my eyes on the vase of flowers on the nightstand and try to block out Asher’s voice, but he’s right there in my ear.
“The day you were supposed to meet Eric, I slashed his tires. When I found out you were having dinner with him, it took
everything in me to not put my fist through his face,” he says softly, but there’s a hard edge to his voice. “I couldn’t let him near you like that. The stars in his eyes when he talked about you… fuck, Poppy. He’s been my closest friend for years, but I swear I wanted to hurt him. I wanted to knock every thought of you from his mind. I hated myself for thinking like that, but I did. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do, nothing I wouldn’t give up to have you.”
“Please, stop. You’re scaring me,” I cry softly. My nails dig into my thighs, trying to distract myself from the pain that’s taking over the rest of my body. My breathing comes in harsh pants, and I feel like I’m hyperventilating.
“Oh, Beautiful, no,” he whispers, his own voice breaking. “Fearing me is the very last thing you should feel.” His lips whisper against my cheek. “I know all this sounds crazy and deluded. I know you have no reason to trust me, but I swear on everything I have, on everything I am, on my name and everything I stand for, I will never hurt you.”
He just doesn’t get it.
“But you already have,” I tell him softly. Turning to finally look at him, I let him see the fear and pain he’s caused me through my eyes. What shocks me is the pain I see reflected back at me. It’s so sharp you’d think I stabbed him in the heart with a dull blade. I hate how the look makes my chest feel even tighter.
“Please, let me go.” I hold his gaze, refusing to back down, begging him to see how much I need him to let me go. I’m at my breaking point. What he’s done has hurt me beyond anything I’ve ever felt before. He made me fall in love with a lie. He made me fall in love with him, knowing his sick obsession would be the end of me.
After searching my gaze for several moments, my breath catches at the fear I see enter his own eyes. I stiffen when he drops his head and lays a tender kiss against my lips. I keep mine sealed shut. Never again will I allow him to kiss me with the passion he’d shown me before. He doesn’t linger. He pulls his head back, then slowly lifts his body from mine. I lay there, not moving until he’s standing beside the bed. My hands automatically go to the sheet still covering my chest.
“I’ll let you go for now, but this isn’t over. I’ll give you time to come to grips with everything, but I’ll never give you up.” He runs both hands through his hair with agitation before finishing softly. “I can’t.”
With that, he turns and slowly makes his way to the door, opens it, and silently walks through. As soon as the door is closed, I run to it and click the lock, only to realize I’m still in his room. Making sure the sheet covers every part of my body, I unlock the door and bolt across the living room to my own bedroom, keeping my eyes away from him as I go. I lock the door behind me, go to my bed, curl into a ball on my side, and cry all the pain and heartache I feel out into my pillow.
I don’t know how long I laid in bed, crying, but eventually I fell asleep. My head hurts and I feel sick to my stomach when I open my eyes and remember all that transpired. I want to believe so much that Asher would never hurt me, but I don’t know what to believe. All I know is I want to go home. I don’t want to be here in his vicinity anymore. What started out as a dream vacation turned into one of the best times of my life, before turning into the worst. I really thought I found someone I could spend the rest of my life with. I guess that’s what I get for falling for someone I never really even knew. Yes, I’ve worked for Asher for quite a while now, but I never really knew anything personal about him.
I just don’t get why, if he was so obsessed with me, he didn’t come to me sooner like a real man would. Why keep it all a secret? Why send me mysterious flowers? Why put cameras in my house? I shudder at the thought. Why follow and check up on me everywhere? Why not just come to me and tell me how he felt? Why keep me in the dark? That would be the logical thing to do, right?
All these questions are ones I’ll never get the answers to, because now it’s too late. It doesn’t matter what the answers are, and I don’t want to know them at this point.
I pull myself from the bed and groggily make my way to the en suite bathroom. My mouth feels like I swallowed cotton balls and my body aches. I want nothing more than to wash off the feeling of Asher that he left behind from last night. I think back to the few times we had sex and thank God I’m on the pill because we never used a condom.
After spending thirty minutes in the shower and having another cryfest, I step out and dry myself off. I cried because I needed Asher’s smell off my body, but it hurt to wash it away, knowing I’ll never have it on me again.
I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and see the mark he left behind last night, the one that left me feeling such pride and satisfaction. Now I just want to scrub it away. I hate knowing it’ll be there for several days to come, reminding me of what we had. Or what I thought we had.
Feeling disgusted, I turn and walk out to the bedroom and root around for some clothes. After pulling on a pair of black yoga pants, a blue short sleeved shirt and flip flops, I pack the rest of my stuff. I take my suitcase with my smaller travel bag on top and my purse over my shoulder out to the living room. I spy Asher sitting on the balcony. I put my stuff by the door and with a heavy heart and dread filling me, I head in his direction. I don’t want to see or speak to him, but I have to in order to get home.
Taking a deep breath, I pull open the sliding glass door, step through the threshold, and stop in my tracks. It couldn’t have been more than a few hours since I last saw him, but the condition he’s in looks like I haven’t seen him in a week, and in that week he’s been out here the entire time. He’s sitting in a lounge chair, his legs spread wide and his hand is wrapped around a half empty glass tumbler. He’s still in his jeans with no shirt, but it’s his face that has my heart seizing. He looks haggard. When he hears me step outside, he slowly turns his head. His eyes are red and look dull, and his hair is more a disheveled mess than it normally is. He obviously hasn’t shaved since yesterday, because his face has a thin layer of dark hair. When he sees me, a small glimmer of light enters his eyes. He lifts his glass to his lips and empties it.
I shift on my feet and look away from him. “I’d like to go home now.”
He doesn’t say anything for a long time. I feel his eyes assessing me, but I keep mine away and wait him out. Eventually, out the corner of my eye, I see him set his glass down on the table before standing up. I take a step back when he walks my way. His gait is slow and cautious, but it makes me no less uneasy. I ache with uncertainty.
“Pop—” He starts, but I forestall him by holding up my hand.
I can’t hear him talk right now. I still don’t understand how I never recognized his voice when we spoke on the phone those few times, while he was acting as Sterling. Was I so enamored with him that I blocked out any recognition? I know he changed his accent slightly, but he can’t be that good.
“Please, just call the jet. I can’t…” I stop to clear my clogged throat and look at him. “I don’t want to be here with you.”
He stops and unbearable pain washes over his face before he wipes it clean, a determined look taking its place.
He nods and fishes his phone out of his pocket. It’s not the same one he used earlier. His eyes stay on me as he brings the phone to his ear.
“Phil, I need the jet back now.” He pauses a moment, then, “Yes, everything’s fine. Something unexpected came up.”
After a quick good-bye, he hangs up, slipping his phone back in his pocket. I stand there for several more seconds, before turning and walking back inside. I feel his presence behind me, but thankfully he doesn’t say anything else and stays far enough away. Without a word to him, I go back to my room and close the door behind me. Releasing the breath I didn’t realize I was holding, I slump back on the bed. Tears prick my eyes, but I force them back.
I have no idea what to do with myself. I work for Asher, but there’s no way I can do that now, knowing what he did. I no longer trust him. I have some savings, but that won’t last me long. I’ll have to find ano
ther job. I have cameras in my house and have no idea where they are. I no longer feel safe there. I have a tracking device on my car. Asher pretty much said he wasn’t giving up on me, and I have no idea what he’s willing to do to get me to agree to be with him.
My phone jingles in my pocket. I pull it out and see Liv’s name. I push ignore, not ready to talk to her. She’ll know right away something is wrong, and I’m not ready to talk about it yet. She’s my best friend, and I’ll eventually have to tell her, especially since I’m not going back to work, but I need a few days to process and come to terms with what’s happened.
And hope I can get my damn chest to stop feeling like it’s caving in on me.
Chapter Seventeen
Asher
Watching Poppy walk away with slumped shoulders is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to see. I want to go to her and pull her into my arms and promise to never let anything hurt her again, but I know that’s the last thing she needs right now from me. I know she hates and fears me because of what transpired earlier. I don’t blame her, but it still hurts like a bitch. Seeing the fear in her eyes and having her confirm that fear, knowing I put that fear there, sucked all the breath from my lungs. I’ve never felt such pain as I did when she said I was scaring her. This is part of the reason why I waited so long to come forward. I just hope I’m so deep in her heart she can eventually forgive me and learn to trust me again.
I don’t want to leave Texas. This is the place I finally got to be myself with Poppy. It’s the place that I showed her my true feelings. The past few days have been some of the best in my life. But I know she needs time.
I walk back out on the balcony and grab my bottle of scotch, foregoing the glass this time. I take a swallow straight from the bottle as I walk to my room to pack my stuff. I slip on a black T-shirt and shoes and carry my suitcase out to the elevator, setting it beside Poppy’s. I look over at her door and see it still closed. I wonder what she’s doing in there. My heart begs me to check on her, but my head tells me I shouldn’t. I knew this was going to hurt when I told her who I was and what I’ve done, but I had no idea the pain would be so debilitating.