“London, I’m going to explain everything,” Brody says firmly, pulling the Range Rover up to the curb and putting it into park. I look out the passenger window toward my mother, whose expression is blank, her face obscured by the raindrops that are beginning to land on the windows of the vehicle. “Stay right here, okay? Do not move until I come back.”
I nod, even though I have no intention of listening.
My whole life has been about outrunning the hurt, trying to get as far as I can away from it before it sticks to me. This time, it’s already stuck, but I’ll keep going and hope my feelings for this man go away.
As soon as Brody gets out of the car and approaches my mother, I throw myself out of the passenger door and book it across the street, holding my ripped T-shirt together and cutting through the darkness. Brody shouts my name, alarmed, but I continue to sprint, cursing my choice of flip flops from this morning. The sky opens up overhead and the rain gets worse, dampening the asphalt, thunder rolling in the distance. Tears are blurring my vision, making the streetlights look like little balls of fire. I ignore the burning in my lungs and keep running, needing to get away from the vision of Brody walking away from me, just like everyone else.
There’s a park at the end of the street. Blindly, I run toward it, hoping to find somewhere to take cover long enough to think of a plan. But I’ve only gotten halfway through the park when I’m dragged to a stop by an immovable object. An arm bands around my middle and I’m elevated off the ground, legs still moving in mid-air, my back meeting a hard chest.
“I told you not to move until I came back,” Brody bellows above my head. “Don’t you ever run from me again. You could have gotten hurt, London.”
“Put me down,” I scream, fighting his hold, panicking. “Please don’t make me come back. Please just let me go!”
“What part of forever don’t you understand?” He stomps us toward an overhang of trees, putting us out of sight from the houses on the other side of the street. “I am never letting you go. Don’t even say those words out loud.”
“You have to. She’s back and now you have t-to leave me. Or move on.” A hiccup wracks me. “It happens every single time and you’re not going to be any different.”
“Oh, I’m not?” He sets me down on the dampening earth and spins me around, taking my shoulders in his big hands. “I know you’ve been hurt, baby, and that you’re scared. But you need to trust me.”
I’m already shaking my head. “No. No—”
“Dammit, we were supposed to have time.” He squeezes his eyes closed. “I thought the money I gave your mother would keep her gone, but I underestimated how irresponsible she is.”
“Money?” I sniff hard, wiping tears and rain off my cheeks. “I don’t understand. What are you talking about?”
Brody sighs unevenly, his hands dropping away from my shoulders. He paces away, hands on hips and comes back. And I gasp when the moonlight catches his face, because…he’s more intense than I’ve ever seen him. His eyes are so penetrating that my pulse tumbles end over end. “I paid her to leave so I’d have you alone when you came home. All to myself. I met your mother in a bar. She was going on and on to the bartender about needing some medical procedure, a cist removed, but she didn’t have the insurance coverage. It wasn’t any of my business. I wasn’t interested in the conversation. But then…she unlocked her phone and I saw you on the screen.” He takes a step closer. “God help me, I was done. I knew you. I looked into your eyes and you were mine.”
“What?” Confusion floods me. “But you…married my mother.”
“I married her so she’d have the benefit of my insurance. But she never had me, London. Not once. I’d never lay a fucking finger on her. There’s only you.” He advances on me further, but I take several steps back, unable to breathe, trying to get a handle on what he’s telling me. Trying to puzzle my way through. Is this real? Or a dream? “We had an understanding, she and I. She gets medical coverage and some money to occupy her…and I get to be the one who welcomes you home. Feeds you and puts a roof over your head. She wasn’t supposed to come back so soon. Not before you and I had trust between us. Not before I could explain—and I was planning on telling you everything tonight.”
Rain is dripping unchecked down my face now. I’m in too much shock to wipe it away. Since yesterday, I’ve been living in an alternate reality. None of my beliefs were based in fact. “Did she know you would…sleep with me?”
“We never said it out loud,” he says hoarsely.
“But it was understood.”
His throat works with a swallow. “I suppose so. It was very hard to keep my feelings hidden. And eventually, one of the administrators called her and she discovered by accident that I’d been…”
“What?”
“Going to watch you. On the surveillance cameras at the facility.” He wets his lips and I can’t subdue a flare of excitement at the sight. “Every day. Sometimes more than once. I abused my badge as badly as I abused my cock…and I couldn’t help it. Being without you turned me hollow. I walked around starved for months, just waiting for your release. Counting the seconds.”
Oh my God.
I should be screaming. Running.
Sprinting as far and fast as I can. For a very different reason than the first time I ran tonight. This man, Brody, my stepfather, has been stalking me. He coordinated our meeting, our living situation, everything. He planned on making me his before I ever knew who he was.
Watched me when I was unaware.
That is terrifying.
At least…it should be.
Why is there a coil of heat in my tummy? Pleasurable goose bumps on my arms?
Why am I relieved? It’s as though I’ve been wrapped in a blanket fresh from the dryer.
There has to be something wrong with me.
“I will make her leave again.” He comes toward me with measured steps, eyes steady and watchful and dark. “And you’ll sleep in my bed tonight.”
“I can’t,” I whisper, retreating. Can I?
A touch of madness flares in his expression. “You will.”
Wetness spreads between my legs, despite my mind telling me this is wrong. My body is disagreeing, insisting that being with Brody is right. That it’s okay to feel relief and happiness that he’s wanted me all along. Even obsessed over me. Stalked me. For once, something in my life was planned and not another mishap or kick in the rear from fate. This man is offering me a home—himself—and it’s a home I want to live in. Desperately.
Gravity seems to stop me in my tracks, allowing my stepfather to reach me, hauling me up against his chest, pulling me onto my toes and groaning into the crook of my neck. “The way I want and need you isn’t natural, I know that. It’s fucked up. But it’s real and it will never, ever go away. I’m permanent. I’ll never move a fucking inch, London. Just give in to it.”
My neck falls back as if a string has been cut. “I want to, but…”
He holds his head. “But what?”
“You’re married to someone else.”