“Are you okay?”
I nod, although I am barely paying attention to the movie when she restarts it. Yes, I knew she might leave the show. I came up here to convince her to come back, but it is hitting me that my worry is not about the show. It’s about us. About how much I need her in my life.
I can’t fail. She laughs at something, and I glance at her. When she’s happy, it’s the most amazing thing. Her laugh, the way her eyes dance, the curve of her lips…
I shift my weight on the sofa cushions trying to ease the pressure in my pants. From the moment I brought my things into her house, I’ve been half hard. I don’t know what it is but being here with her is different than all the times before.
“Are you going to eat any?”
I blink and look over at her, then down at the popcorn. I grab a handful and offer her a smile as I crunch on the savory, buttery snack. Yeah, this is different. I’m embarrassed that I am using a threat to her life to stay at her house, but desperate times call for insane measures.
“You’re acting weird.”
I look at her. Yeah, I am. Usually, I’m laughing along with her and discussing the movie, especially one that we’ve seen a couple times together.
“Just thinking.”
She leans closer and sniffs the air around me. “Oh, yeah, I thought I smelled something burning.”
“I thought maybe you had decided to cook something other than popcorn.”
She throws her head back and laughs. “That’s true.”
The tension dissipates a little, and we watch the rest of the movie without any odd moments. An hour later I’m lying in bed, staring up at the ceiling. Josh has a deputy outside keeping an eye on things until Grady can get someone here to keep surveillance on Nancy and the house. The alarm is set, and everything is quiet.
But I can’t sleep.
You might lose her forever.
Yeah, the show could come to an end, but right now, that isn’t important. No, what bothers me is that she might be out of my life. No Nancy texts where she mocks me. Or the inappropriate jokes.
Evil Sis: Hey, didn’t hear back from you so I thought you might need some guidance.
Yeah, sure, Syd. I want my sister telling me what to do about my love life.
Still, I can’t ignore her texts because if there is one person who knows Nancy better than I do, it’s Syd.
Me: Of course you do.
Evil Sis: You will not lose her if you take a chance.
Me: How can you be sure of that?
And why am I texting with my sister about this? It’s weird. Well, we are weird. With an absent father, a drug addict mother, and an asshole of grandfather as caregivers, we only had each other. Until we met Nancy. Then it was always the three of us. But Syd and me, we are closer than a lot of siblings.
Evil Sis: All those feelings you hid through the years, they are mutual.
I blink down at the text. She’s telling me that Nancy loves me? Is this her way of gently nudging me?
Evil Sis: Just…dkawenaweotin
I blink. Did my sister just have a stroke?
Evil Sis: Sorry, Grady tried to take my phone away from me. Just tell her how you feel. Honesty always works best.
I sigh and put my phone back on the bedside table. According to my sister, her best friend returns my feelings. What do I do about that?
I fucking go for it.
That’s what I do. With a smile on my face, I start to plan. Nancy isn’t going to know what hit her. I just have to be patient and, thankfully, we are stuck with each other for a few days. Tomorrow morning, I will set my plan into motion.
Chapter Eighteen
Nancy
Three long days and I’m ready to run out to whoever is trying to screw with me and offer myself up on a platter. Yes, it makes me a bit of a drama queen, but I can’t help it. If you were here, you would feel the same way. I promise. Things have escalated in other ways—not that I think I need to worry that much about some loser who decided he needed to knife my tire. It’s a little disturbing, but nothing else has happened, so hopefully that means he moved on. Or maybe, it just was some idiot with nothing to do and he wanted to knife any tire.
In Juniper, things are going as usual. Josh tried to keep a lid on it, but someone from his office blabbed—probably that Jamie Crocker whose grandma is one of the most active in the LOL group. As soon as everyone was alerted to the issue, they have been stopping by and bringing me food. Because, you know, being stuck at home is the perfect time to be laden down with all kinds of carbs.
So, yeah, I have been stuffing my face. I mean, no one brings me a salad, and I have to do something with my feelings, so I eat. A LOT. I probably gained five pounds since Travis moved in.
We do go out here and there, but I am trying to stick close to home for a couple of reasons. One, I am just not in the mood to deal with questions about the situation. People in Juniper have no problem walking right up and making rude inquiries. The other reason is I don’t want to have any of those idiots get caught in the crossfire. Do I think the stalker is going to come after me with a gun? No. If it is someone after me, it just seems like he wants to bother me. He knows I made it home okay, but there hasn’t been a peep. My car is sitting in my garage right now. I get the feeling this is more about giving me crap, making me uncomfortable. I’ve read a lot of information about stalkers since this started. I’m stuck at home for the most part, so I have to fill my days with something. So, I obsess, reading the accounts.
Most of them go this way: stalker starts obsessing. Gifts happen…sometimes. Then, they get angry at the lack of one on one interaction. It soon turns to rage that either ends in their arrest or the death of whoever they are obsessed with. First thing I’m irritated with is that I never experienced the gift part. I mean, isn’t that par for the course? And yes, I know that I’m complaining about a stalker not sending me weird gifts. Second thing that bothers me is there was never a contact…like the honeymoon phase of the stalking. Although there is a chance I just didn’t notice. Things get sent to a PO Box at the studio or to my agent in New York. Still, it doesn’t feel as if they are obsessed with me in a ‘I used to be in love with you’ way. This feels more like whoever it is, he’s pissed at me about something. The list of those people is probably long.
Josh has run out of leads. Like, there is no one who hates me enough to want to kill me, which is great, except that it leaves me without knowing who is threatening me. Because no matter how much I try to think otherwise, the rational part of my brain tells me that someone wants to hurt me. Or at least scare me. Even Reggie checked out, and he’s already left town. With a little digging, Josh found out that he’s almost flat broke, so apparently my grandmother was trying to sell me off. Or it appears that way. It gives me such warm fuzzies. I know that he will be at my grandmother’s birthday party on Friday. And Josh thinks that if Reggie had anything to do with the stalking, he would have hired someone to do it and I agree. Reggie is the kind of man who expects other people to do the hard work.
With no indication that the stalker—I hate using that term but what do you call the person who knifed your tire—is even still in town, I should be relaxed, right? But I am not. Not by a very long shot.
No, because there is a six foot-five-inch problem traipsing around my house every day. You know, the sexy mountain man I’m in love with. Every day he pushes me a little further into insanity. Those dimples and chocolate eyes. My pussy is ready to take control of my every thought and action. I am steadily losing control of my own body. He tempts me like no other man, and I’m at the end of my rope. If we don’t get out of here soon, I’m going to jump Travis. At this point, I don’t know if I’ll kill him or kiss him. It’s a toss-up. And it’s like he knows how I feel or something. He seems to find reasons not to wear his shirt all the time. No matter what, I see all that glorious flesh at least twice a day. It takes all of my control not to lean forward and take a huge bite out of one his pecs, then lick down his torso, tracing the ridges in his abs with my tongue.