Total pages in book: 28
Estimated words: 25708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 129(@200wpm)___ 103(@250wpm)___ 86(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 129(@200wpm)___ 103(@250wpm)___ 86(@300wpm)
We’re at the Motel 6 before I realize twenty minutes has passed.
There is an incessant buzzing in my ears, my mouth is cotton dry.
My nipples are hard, like hot metal.
I’m uncomfortably wet—and not just from Cash’s fluids, which continue to leak out of me, turning my panties sopping wet. I have to face facts, there is some animal trait inside of me that Cash found and cultivated, forced me to acknowledge. I’m…excited by the fact that he followed and photographed, threatened and stalked me…as much as I’m horrified by it. But what feeling is more dominant? Excitement or fear?
Love or terror?
I don’t know.
But as I thank the Uber driver and climb out of the back seat, intending to go inside and rent a room for the night, I somehow know I won’t be calling my brother, my parents or the police. I just know that I won’t. Because through exposing Cash, there is every chance I will expose myself as someone who enjoys his ferociousness. His obsession with me.
And deep down, I hold the firm belief that he won’t hurt me.
Something inside me knows that.
At least, he won’t hurt me too bad.
Right?
Regardless, no matter how I feel about him or what he did, the fact remains that he lied to me. Duped me. Made me believe he was helping me catch a stalker, when in reality, he was indulging in his fantasies about me. I won’t ever put up with lies.
I think…I think I want to explore the part of me that comes alive in the eye of Cash’s storm. His aggression and possessiveness. The part that likes to hunt me. But there is no way I can let him get off scot-free for being untruthful with me.
He’ll pay for that before he ever lays a finger on me again.
Maybe instead of going to the authorities, I’ll do something else.
We’ll be equal partners in this twisted relationship or there won’t be a relationship.
So, I’ll show him that.
I’ll give him a taste of his own medicine…and see how he likes it.
8
Cash
The world is on fire.
I can’t find Scout and I could rip my skin off, it’s so painful to be alive.
I continue to function, to breathe and move and think, but it’s only to find her.
She tricked me in the movie theater, looking up at me with drowsy affection, when all the while, she was preparing to run. There’s a part of me that is impressed by how well she played me, but I can’t appreciate it fully now. Maybe ever.
Not until she’s back in my possession.
After I leave the theater, my first order of business is tracking down her phone and when I find it on the side of the highway, I have the urge to step into traffic. Right into the path of the speeding cars. Not in order to kill myself. No. Because in my current state of galvanized agony, I am positive the vehicles would bounce right off me, but perhaps the impact would take my mind off the distress causing my heart to collapse.
I go to my off-campus apartment. Her dorm.
She is not in either place.
I roam the campus like a bleeding animal, incapable of responding to people who call my name, recognizing me from baseball. They call things to me like “good game” as if a sport matters when I don’t have Scout. She is my lifeblood, and she has drained herself from my veins, leaving me in a zombie state.
Does she hate me for stalking her?
Is she scared of me?
Where the hell is she? Is she huddled somewhere hurt and terrified that I’ll find her? Hurt her? I wouldn’t, I swear. I would just tie her down securely and make her understand that she has made me like this. That I have no control over my response to her. Yes, I will imprison her and reason with her until she agrees to stay with me forever. That’s not the same as hurting her, right? No. It’s as humane as I can be.
At the edge of campus now, I stare out into the trees that surround the grounds, shoving five shaking fingers through my hair, realizing my hands are covered in blood and dirt. Where have I been for the last six hours? What have I been doing? The search for Scout is all a blur, but…I think this is my own blood. After I found her phone on the side of the highway, I have memories of searching in the woods, falling to my hands and knees and tearing at the earth. Bellowing her name again and again until my voice turned hoarse.
A tingle climbs the back of my neck and I spin around.
My breath in the night air creates a thin cloud of fog.
Is someone watching me?
In the distance, I hear the snap of a twig and the pulse at the side of my neck begins to pound. I’m delusional at this point, though. I’m not thinking straight. I’m looking for Scout in a place she would never be. In the woods at night? Watching me? That’s ridiculous.