She’s giggling now, holding her sides with the hilarity of it all.
“I don’t understand the dick pic. Do men really think we want to see that? Are y’all so proud of what God gave you that you can’t help yourselves from showing it off? Because I have to tell you, as a female, we do not want photos of your penis. I enjoy your penis, and I still don’t want a keepsake photo of it. Dicks aren’t the most attractive part of the male anatomy.”
“I’m uncomfortable with this conversation.” I shift in my seat and frown at my salad. “I don’t send pictures of myself naked.”
“Oh, men don’t even have to be naked to send them. All they do is just whip them out and snap a photo. It’s disgusting.”
“How often do you receive them?”
“Daily.”
I choke on my lettuce and have to take a drink of water. “Daily?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s a common occurrence. And I’d bet women who aren’t famous get them on the regular, too. Men are just . . . proud. And it’s baffling.”
“I can’t say that I know anyone who does that.” I shake my head as Starla shoves her empty salad aside and wipes her mouth.
“Okay, let’s get this over with.”
She pulls out a letter and reads it, then smiles as she tucks it back into the envelope and sets it aside. “This is the keep pile.”
“What did it say?”
“It was from a young girl who said she enjoys my songs. She was very sweet. Those are my favorites. They just sound so innocent.”
We both reach for more mail, and over the next half hour, we read a wide array of messages, everything from the usual you’re my favorite artist to a marriage proposal that joined the trash pile.
“Come on, he was handsome,” Starla says, laughing her ass off.
“I’m so glad you’re finding the humor in this.”
“I had no idea that proposals and dick pics from strangers would make you so jealous.”
“Six dick pics,” I remind her. “In this box alone. What the fuck is wrong with people?”
“Proud,” she says again. “So damn proud.”
“I guess.” I reach for a bigger envelope and pull out a typed letter and a picture. Starla’s reading something else, and I don’t alert her to what’s in my hands.
Not yet.
The photo is of the two of us at the restaurant, sitting in the booth, before the rude waitress approached.
The image has been altered to look like we’ve both had our necks slashed, with blood coming out of our mouths, dripping onto the table.
I set it face-down on the table and read the letter.
Dear cunt,
God, I fucking hate you. Look at you, just out there living your life as if you shouldn’t feel guilty for anything. As if you’re innocent.
We both know you’re not innocent, you stupid bitch.
And I’m going to make you pay.
Looks like you have someone who means something to you now. I’ll make him pay, too. Before I kill you slowly. I’ll torture him, right in front of your eyes so you can feel what I felt. It’s all your fault.
Soon.
Rage. Blinding, boiling rage is all I feel as I set the letter face-down over the photo and take a long, deep breath.
“Levi?”
“Give me a minute. Don’t touch this.”
I stand and walk to the back door, staring through the glass to the pool in the back yard. I need a second to reel in my emotions. I want to kill whoever sent this. I want five minutes alone with them so I can tear them limb from limb.
“Levi, talk to me.”
I turn to find her standing behind me, wringing her hands at her waist.
“You need to read this.”
I walk back to the table and retrieve the letter. Starla takes it from me, and her eyes scan the page, getting wider the longer she reads.
“My God.” She covers her mouth and reads it again. “What the hell?”
“There’s a photo.”
She looks up at me as a tear falls from the corner of her eye.
“Let me see.”
I want to say no. I want to shield her from this bullshit. But she needs to see it, so I pass it to her.
With one glance, she drops it to the floor and runs for the bathroom, heaving into the toilet.
I hurry after her and rub her back, then wet a washrag with cold water and press it to the back of her neck.
“Easy, baby.”
“I don’t understand,” she murmurs, reaching for the rag and wiping it over her face, her mouth. “What in the hell is happening?”
“Clearly, someone is pissed at you.”
I take the rag from her and rinse it, then wipe it over her forehead, her cheeks. When she’s calmed down, we walk back to the table. I retrieve the letter and photo and set them face-down on the surface again.
“It’s not nothing,” I say.
“No.” She swallows. “It’s not.”
“I’ll take this to the station tonight. But first, I want to ask you, have you wronged anyone so horribly that they could want to hurt you?”
She frowns at me. “Of course, not. I haven’t fired anyone. I haven’t done anything. I have no idea what this is about.”
“I didn’t think so, but I had to ask. Also, this is a good time to address your security team. Or the lack thereof.”
“What about them?”
“I wasn’t impressed after the show a couple months ago. They let too many people touch you.”
“They do a fine job.”
“They’re not here now.”
She scowls. “Of course, not. I’m not working, remember? I don’t want them with me for the day-to-day.”
“Not even now?”
“You have a car parked outside my house twenty-four-seven. That’s plenty.”
I sigh and rub my hand down my face. “Here’s the thing, Starla. I’m not convinced it’s plenty. Not after this. So, for the foreseeable future, you won’t ever be alone. If I can’t be with you, Jax or Meredith will be.”
“I’m a prisoner.”
“You’re a person we all care about, and we’re going to take care of you,” I counter. “I’m going to find out who this sick bastard is, and we’ll put an end to this. But in the meantime, you’re not alone. That’s non-negotiable.”
“Fine.”
“And I’m moving in here.”
She cocks a brow. “Gee, you’re so romantic.”
“This isn’t how I intended to tell you we’re moving in together, but it is what it is.”
She blinks rapidly. “You mean you were going to ask me?”
“No, that’s not what I meant.” I take her hand and kiss her thumb. “Besides, we’ve already adopted a kitten. Did you think we’d be sharing custody?”
A slow smile spreads over her gorgeous face. “How sweet. We’re fur-parents.”
“Funny. Never alone, you understand?”
“Yes, sir.” Her mouth is sassy, but she climbs into my lap and lays her head on my shoulder. “Why do people suck?”
“That’s the question of the year.”
~Starla~
He’s comforting me. I’m trying to pretend that it doesn’t bother me, that the upchucking in the toilet was just because of the graphic content of the photo, but the whole situation is starting to freak me the fuck out.
I just don’t want to lose my freedom. I’m independent, almost to a fault.
Obviously.
“You should think about warning your family,” Levi says as his hand rubs up and down my back.
“I’ll call Jax and Mer in just a bit.”
“No.” He kisses my temple. “Your biological family. You may not want to have much to do with them, but a good stalker will try to find ways to hurt you, and they will threaten your family, too.”
“There’s really no way anyone could trace me to my family.” I lean back and look him in the eyes. “And I’m not saying that just because I don’t want to
talk to them. My legal name isn’t tied to theirs. I have never spoken about my family to anyone, personally or publicly, except for Mer and Jax, and they aren’t telling anyone. If I thought they were in danger, I would contact them, but I don’t believe they are.”
“What the hell, Star? What’s the backstory here?”
I sigh and lay my head on his shoulder again. I should talk to him about them. I know that.
I just hate it. I never discuss them. I haven’t said their names in more than fifteen years.
But Levi’s different. Whatever we have here—and if I’d stop being so damn stubborn, I’d admit that it’s love—is important to me, and I don’t want secrets with him. I would be hurt if the tables were turned.
“You know those cults, mostly in the south, where people hold snakes in church, and it’s all fire and brimstone and stuff?”
“I’ve seen news reports about it.”
“Well, I’ve seen it up close and personal. It’s not a real church. They say they’re Christians, but what I grew up in wasn’t that. It was horrible and evil. It was the worst extreme you can think of, times a hundred.”
I move from his lap to my chair facing him and push my hair up into a bun, using the hair tie I keep on my wrist.
“My father is the high priest. That’s what he calls himself. Sometimes, he’s the bishop. I think it just depends on his mood.
“They would bring snakes, venomous ones, into church every month. Sometimes, people would get bit and die. It was a freak show. Not to mention, I was required to get up at four every morning to memorize bible verses until it was time for schoolwork. We weren’t allowed to go to regular school. And it wasn’t normal homeschool either. My parents felt that both of those things were full of Satan, so they taught us at home. I learned to read by reading the bible.”
“Lovely,” Levi says and rubs his fingers over his mouth. “How many siblings do you have?”
“Nine.”
His head snaps up in surprise. “Nine?”
“There are ten of us altogether, but I’m the only one who left. I was always the rebellious one. I listened to radio stations that weren’t allowed. I cut off all my hair myself, ruining blond hair that went to my ass. I liked breaking the rules because I thought they were ridiculous.
“And I was punished.”
“Punished how?”
I raise my shirt and turn to the side, not able to look him in the eye. “These scars?”
“I’ve felt them,” he confirms softly.
“Whip marks.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?”
I shake my head. “No. I’ve thought about covering them with a tattoo, but I don’t know what I want. Punishments included whippings, starvation, having to walk around naked for days. You name it. They always said it was God’s will that they punish me like that.”
“Assholes.”
“For sure. I don’t have any idea how they came to be that way. I don’t know if my father was just a psychopath and brainwashed my mother. I don’t even know who my grandparents are.
“There were about forty people in the church. Twelve of those were our family. It was like being in prison. It was awful. So, when I turned eighteen, I packed a change of clothes and ran away.
“I went to LA, and I had to lie on job applications just so I could get some work to have money. I waited tables, I cleaned hotel rooms. Anything. One of the hotels was the Roosevelt, and I was singing in the hallway by my cart one morning. Donald, my manager, heard me and asked me if I’d come to LA to try to be a singer.
“I told him that I came to LA to find a life. It was really that simple. And that’s the last day I ever woke up wondering how I was going to eat or pay the rent. Donald took me in and helped me form a career that most people only dream of.”
“Good for you,” Levi says and reaches over to take my hand in his. “Now I understand why you don’t have any contact with them.”
“I do send them money.”
“What?” His voice is utterly calm, but every muscle contracts.
“I do.” I shrug a shoulder. “About a year after the music took off, I had a private investigator look into them. They never filed a missing person’s report on me. Ever. Because I also didn’t have a birth certificate. According to the county, I’d never been born. Which explains why no one came to find out why my siblings and I weren’t in school.
“When I was in LA and changed my name, I had to forge an original birth certificate. Anyway, they were still doing their thing, living in squalor. They’d had another baby. And all I could think was, those kids deserve something. I’m never going back there to physically help them. I can’t. But I did have the investigator call CPS to report the family, and I send money in the oldest siblings’ names, for them to help the others.
“They had to sign legal papers that state they can’t give money to the church. They can’t help our parents. It’s for the kids. And I don’t send it directly. It goes through my financial people, so I’m very hands-off.”
“None of them have left? Gone to look for you?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
“Star, could this stalker be one of them?”
That brings me up short. I blink, staring at Levi. Is it possible? I suppose it is. The older kids know who I am.
“It’s not impossible,” I concede, speaking slowly. “But they receive a lot of money, Levi. I can’t imagine they’d want—”
“If they’re angry at you for leaving, or for being a celebrity, or anything, they could do it. If they have mental health issues like your parents . . .”
“I hadn’t thought of that. I guess I could call my investigator and have him peek in on them. He does every couple years or so.”
“Give me his name,” Levi says, opening his phone. “I’ll call him.”
I should bristle at that. Eddie is under my employ, and he’s always been excellent at maintaining confidentiality. But the idea of taking another step back from my family is too enticing to throw away.
I open my phone, find Eddie’s info, and send it to Levi.
“There you go. We can call him together tomorrow, and I’ll let him know it’s okay to work directly with you.”
“It’s in my calendar,” Levi confirms. “If it comes down to telling them what’s going on here—”
“It won’t.” I cut him off and cross my arms over my chest. “Trust me, they don’t care. And I know it’s not about them anyway. This has been going on for a long time, and they’ve never mentioned my family.”
Levi doesn’t meet my eyes as he carefully sets his phone down, then links his fingers together and leans on the table.
“Excuse me?”
I swallow. Shit.
“Starla.”
“I’ve been getting emails for a few months.”
“How many months?”
“Six? Eight?”
“Christ.” He stands and paces around the kitchen. “You didn’t think it was a good idea to tell me?”
“They weren’t threatening until very recently. Just . . . weird. And I’ve never received photos like this until the one you saw of me and Meredith.”
“I can’t protect you if I don’t know everything.”
“Well, now you do.” I stand and prop my hands on my hips. “You saw the dick pics in this box. The proposal. This isn’t even a fraction of the shit that happens on Instagram. The shit that comes through the public email address. People are disgusting, Levi, and I’ve learned to filter out most of it. I ignore it.”
“So, these emails are coming to your personal account.”
“Yeah, but any decent hacker could probably find it.” I shrug. “I mean, I would think. I really didn’t think it was a big deal.”
“It’s a big deal,” he replies and paces away from me. “That night that I didn’t come here after work? Remember?”
“Yes.”
“I’d been working a stalker case. The girl was obsessed with this guy. He was ma
rried, had kids. Didn’t want anything to do with her. She was crazy. So, we arrested her for harassment, and I told him to get a restraining order.”
He looks outside again.
“That morning I left, I got a call from Matt. He was at the guy’s residence and thought I should come since I was working the case. I got there . . .” He shakes his head. “I got there, and the guy’s wife was dead. Stabbed. I won’t describe the rest of it to you because I still can’t get it out of my head. It haunts me.”
He turns to me.
“The stalker was dead, too. The guy came home from work and found the stalker slicing up his wife. Shot her in the head. My point is, the wife’s dead, Starla. She’s dead because her husband didn’t think it was a big deal and didn’t report anything to the police until it had gone too far. Your life is too precious to fuck around with this.”
“I’m sorry.” I wrap my arms around his middle and press my face to his chest. “I’m so sorry you went through that.”
“Bad days happen,” he reminds me. “And I’ll be damned if I let that happen to you. It’s a big deal, and we’re going to get to the bottom of this.”
“Maybe it’s all for show?” But we both know it’s not.
“Maybe.” He sighs. “Grab your laptop. We’re going to the office. I want my tech guys to look this over, and not just through a forwarded message. I’m also taking the letter on the table for prints. They might be able to find something on it.
“What scares me the most is that they’re following you. They followed you shopping with Meredith, and us out for dinner. I haven’t seen anything suspicious.”
“I haven’t felt like I’m being watched.” I rub my hands up and down my arms. “Until now. Now, I’m creeped out.”
“That makes two of us,” he mutters. “Come on. Let’s do this.”
“This is no big deal,” Levi says two days later. He’s leaning against the doorjamb of my bathroom, watching me primp. “They’re going to love you.”
“I’m meeting your parents.” I stare at him in the mirror as I hold my curling iron, waiting for my hair to curl. “Of course, it’s a big deal. I could just stay here while you go celebrate your dad’s birthday.”
“No.” He shakes his head and walks up behind me. His hands glide from my hips, move up my sides, and cup my breasts. “You’re not allowed to be alone.”
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