64

LAURA
The next time I opened my eyes, I was in a…room?
I was sitting on a chair, which, along with a bed, bedside table and wardrobe, were the only things in the otherwise empty room.
One minute I’d been walking at the beach and the next, I was in a room I couldn’t remember ever entering. How the hell had I ended up in this unfamiliar room?
Squinting, I struggled to remember. Then I did.
The masculine hand that had grabbed me from behind, pressing a cloth to my face, and that foul smell. My God, it had been so bad, I’d passed out from it.
Wait. I’d passed out.
Heart slamming against my rib-cage, I jerked up from the chair I was sitting on, but was pulled back down by a weight on my hands. I realized that both of my hands were handcuffed to the arms of the chair at the same moment what I assumed was the bathroom door opened and a big form stepped out.
The shock that gripped me at the person standing in the room with me, was enough to immobilize me momentarily, my jaw falling open. “Derrick?”
My neighbor stared back at me, lips curled with blue eyes lit up in amusement. “Oh, it’s all so worth it to see the the surprise on your face.”
What the fuck?
I followed him with my eyes as he shut the door then shortened the distance between us to sit on the edge of the bed, directly opposite me. I tucked my feet under the chair, wishing I could scoot away from him.
“Derrick, I’ve got three questions for you. One, what are you doing here? Two, what am I doing here? And three, why the fuck am I handcuffed to a chair?”
He merely shrugged. “It’s my friend’s place. He’s out of town at the moment so he’s letting me borrow it,” he said and that was it.
It wasn’t lost on me that he’d answered just one of my questions, and the least important one at that, leaving the most important ones unanswered.
Really, I could give a fuck what he was doing here. What I wanted to know was how I’d ended up here, so I switched tactics and asked a different question.
“How did I get here?” When he only stared at me, glazed eyes crawling over my skin in a way that had me suspecting he wasn’t even listening to me, I raised my voice. “At the beach, was it you who grabbed me from behind and shoved that badly smelling cloth in my nose?”
That seemed to get his attention. “Yes.”
I blinked at his easy admission, shocked that he hadn’t even attempted to deny it. And it was on a whisper that the next question left my mouth. “What was in it?”
His eyes met mine, cold and terrifying. “Chloroform.”
My blood ran cold.
He had just admitted to dousing a piece of cloth with chloroform which he’d used to pass me out-this, he’d done at a public beach without a single fear of getting caught-then brought me here, wherever here was, and had proceeded to handcuff me to a chair.
Whatever his motives were, they couldn’t be good.
Hell, they had to be downright dangerous, because if not, why had he thought it important to restrain me?
Shit. Shit. Shit.
That was what I was in. Deep fucking shit.
“Derrick,” I called softly, approaching him like one did a rabid dog. His eyes widened in surprise because it was the softest I’d ever spoken to him. “Why did you bring me here?”
“Because I’ve been trying to talk to you for ages and this is the only way I can.”
I cocked my head to the side, beginning to wonder if perhaps a nut had gone loose in his head. “You passed me out and handcuffed me to a chair because you want to talk to me?”
What happened to talking over coffee like normal people did?
Before I even knew what was happening, Derrick shot up from the bed, his eyes filling with anger. “Don’t you dare give me that look like I’m crazy!” I jerked in surprise at his outburst, my heart racing in my chest. “I tried to talk to you several times but you ignored my texts and calls. Even in person, you wouldn’t give me two fucking minutes. You left me no choice. Lord knows I tried.”
He was panting now, his chest rising and falling beneath the black shirt he was wearing.
I lifted my palms in a sign of surrender as much as the handcuffs would allow me. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Please sit down so we can talk. You want us to talk, don’t you?”
I was beginning to suspect what was happening here.
Derrick was insane. That had to be the only explanation for what was happening right now.
He said he’d brought me here to talk to me, so did that mean that he’d driven all the way from Manhattan, had been randomly walking at the beach and happened to be in possession of a chloroform-soaked piece of cloth when he’d stumbled upon me?
And what the fuck? Did he just happen to have chloroform lying around?
Despite his abrupt burst of anger, my words seemed to calm him down and he sat down again, but not before tugging my chair closer to his.
I shrank back but I didn’t dare complain for fear he would stop being nice and show me his aggressive side, which he’d just proven a few minutes ago, was very much existent.
“How did you know I was going to be at the beach?”
He gave me a look. “I always know where you are.”
Alarm rang inside my head at those words. “But how?”
“Because I’ve been following you,” he confessed. “I love you so much, Laura, I can’t stand you being out of my sight.”
Blood whooshed in my ears, eyes widening as I pieced two and two together.
Derrick, completely oblivious, continued, “But you don’t make it easy. You go to that guy’s house and I can’t keep an eye on you anymore. When you left him, I was so glad. So fucking glad. We can be together now.”
His words weren’t registering in my head anymore. They couldn’t. Not with the bomb he’d just dropped.
He follows me everywhere…
He knows about Alex…
He says he loves me…
“Derrick, are you the one who sends me messages with all those fake accounts I keep blocking and the emails too?” I dared to ask.
Please say no.
Please tell me I’m out of my fucking mind for making such a connection in the first place.
My stomach bottomed out when his lips stretched in a sinister grin, displaying teeth that were slightly yellow. “Good. You’re finally catching on.”
I opened my mouth to speak but no word came out. I tried again. Nothing.
My fingers started trembling and soon, my whole body was shaking.
Oh my God.
Derrick, the man who lived in my apartment building, who smiled and waved when he saw me, whom I’d given my phone number simply because I thought he was nice, was my stalker.
Jesus Christ.
Now I could see it. The soft tone of his messages one day then the next, he was being aggressive and forceful, just like how he’d gone from calm to livid right in front of me a while back.
No wonder my building cameras hadn’t been able to find anyone strange coming and going. Because there was absolutely nothing strange about a tenant leaving his house and returning at the end of the day.
My stalker had been living with me all along. So fucking close, and I’d been none the wiser.
My shaking intensified when I remembered the things he’d said in some of his last messages. The vile things he’d said he would do to me if he ever got me alone. How he was going to make me scream until I’d lost my voice while…while…
Oh, God.
Derrick must have noticed the shaking because he covered his hand with mine and I fought the urge to yank my hand away when his callused skin met mine.
“You’re shaking,” he observed. “Do you need a blanket? I don’t think this place has heating.” When I said nothing, he shrugged. “No problem. I’ll just warm you up myself.” Then he started rubbing my palms.
I couldn’t respond because it had just dawned on me how much danger I was in. Before, I’d been happy about leaving my phone back at the house but now, I regretted it.
There was no way for anyone to reach me. I wasn’t even sure how long I’d been here. Mom and Jo had to be worried sick.
Fuck. What do I do?
I asked myself the question over and over again until I decided that the best thing to do right now would be to keep him talking. He only seemed to get mad if I asked him a triggering question so I just needed to stick to safe waters then I would be fine. For now.
I had no plan. I was handcuffed to a chair and he was not a very big man, but he was a man nonetheless and he was bigger and stronger than me.
“Why did-” My voice came out scratchy. Clearing my throat, I tried again. “Why didn’t you ask me out if you really liked me?”
“Because you never gave me the chance,” he cried, frustrated. “You don’t even fully look at me before you’re looking away again. But you’re not like that with him. I’ve seen it. And it fucking pisses me off!”
He was getting aggravated mentioning Alex again and we couldn’t have that.
Safe waters, Laura.
“I’m sorry about that,” I murmured softly. “I’ll change. I promise. So, you followed me from my friends place to my mother’s that day and you’ve been here ever since?”
He shook his head, trailing the tip of his index finger along my skin, leaving goosebumps in his wake. I fought a disgusted shiver.
“I’ve been driving back and forth. I got lucky today when you decided to step out.”
The bitch. He had zero shame.
I wanted to bite that finger off and feed it to the wolves. Actually, I had so many violent thoughts running through my head right now, it was a battle keeping them from showing on my face. I was only succeeding because I knew my life depended on it.
He dragged his hand over the scar on my head from the accident. “You just had to make me hurt you,” he murmured, confirming Alex’s suspicions that someone had tampered with the brakes. That someone being him. “I didn’t want to, you know? I was just so mad that you were with him and not with me. I guess I just wanted to take you away from him somehow.”
He’d wanted to kill me.
How was I so sure that he still didn’t want to?
My heart rate was insane. My blood pressure had to be going through the roof, so I forced myself to calm down.
Mustering a sweet smile, I decided to try my luck. “How about you remove these handcuffs and then we can talk well?”
That triggered him. “No. They stay on!”
“Okay. Okay,” I breathed, backtracking.
Fucking hell, what was I going to do?
Even if I kneed him in the balls, I’d still not be able to get up from this chair. And if I wanted to run with the chair, it would only slow me down. Plus, what if there weren’t anyone outside to help me and he just caught me and brought me back?
The fact that I’d tried to escape would only piss him off and I wouldn’t like to see how the consequences of that would look.
Suddenly, he grabbed my face, roughly pulling it to his. “Kiss me like you kissed him.”
Struggling, I turned my face away. “No.”
“Do it!” He snapped. He sounded desperate. He looked like he’d gone unhinged.
“No!” I cried again, and the word was barely out of my mouth when my head whipped to the side with the force of his slap.
Tears sprang into my eyes immediately, my cheek stinging.
He got up, stalking to the side table by the bed. “I didn’t want to hurt you, Laura, but you leave me no choice.”
When he straightened back up, there was a knife in his hand, the light reflecting off the blade, a testament to how sharp it was.
Oh, no, no, no, no, no.
This had gotten out of hand.
Struggling in my chair, I screamed as he advanced towards me with the blade. But I couldn’t fucking move even as the handcuffs dug into my flesh, tearing my skin.
Grabbing my face, he lifted the blade to it, a mad light dancing in his eyes. “Maybe after I cut you up real good, you’ll have a change of heart then.”
I shut my eyes, the tears that had magically disappeared these last two days, falling freely as I screamed. Fucking begged. “Please! Please don’t do this!”
But my pleas fell on deaf ears and the blade drew closer to my skin. “Oh, I’m so going to enjoy leaving my mark on you.”
My screams intensified as I felt the cold press of the metal on my cheek.
They were so loud, I almost didn’t hear the sound of the door bursting open.