Stalk Her

* * *

Butcher

I stared at her apartment complex. I’d been sitting here for the past twenty minutes. I wanted to drive her home, to make sure she was safe. I even asked her, but didn’t push when she declined. Although I sure as hell wanted to push. But I knew asking her, demanding it, would only drive her further away. So I let her walk home, but I followed, knowing she hadn’t realized.

And then I saw her at the window, looking at the shitty neighborhood then focusing on my SUV. She couldn’t see me, not with the illegally tinted windows. But Poppy wasn’t stupid. She knew my vehicle was out of place for this area.

And then she walked away, probably dismissing it as nothing more than some shady shit going down, maybe a drug dealer.

I opened up my cell and dialed the club. Diesel was the one who answered, but by the slurred tone of his voice, I knew he was too far gone to do the task I wanted him to.

“Put Reaper on the phone.” I could hear the music pumping on the other end of the line, the club girls giggling, moans and groans following. Reaper was on the line a second later.

“Yo,” he said in his husky voice, the slight pitch of his Russian accent coming through even though he’d been living in America for a few decades.

“I need you to watch a house for me.” I gave him her address and then disconnected the call.

I’d stay here until he arrived, until I knew she was watched and protected, especially in this neighborhood… especially with the secrets I knew she had.

I could tell by looking at her, at the way she moved, the way she acted, she had darkness in her. Hell, we all had secrets and darkness and pain, but I was good at reading people, finding out about those dark places we didn’t want anyone to see.

I’d find hers out. It didn’t matter what she was hiding, because I’d already decided she’d be mine. But making her mine meant finding out everything about her.

That meant stalking her.

Chapter Six

Poppy

I stared at myself in the mirror before I finally said screw it and shut the light off. After grabbing my bag, I left my apartment and made my way downstairs toward the entrance. The front door slammed shut behind me, the sound of metal against metal loud, a violent shot like a bullet from a gun.

I made my way down the cracked, worn sidewalk. The heavy sound of the bass on a stereo resounded, and the playful scream of kids in the distance filled my ears. I could hear a fight breaking out between a man and a woman close by, their cursing seeming to echo off the tall buildings. The smell of filth and exhaust surrounded me like this thick, lead blanket that was suffocating.

And already I was used to it. It was just like home.

Shitty cars sat on either side of the sidewalks, but I stopped when I saw a much too nice SUV again parked a few yards away. Was it the same one from last night? A different one? Maybe it was the same one, having stayed the night?

My heart was racing, my hands slightly shaking. I wasn’t a stranger to fear, and that adrenaline pumping through my veins… that was what fear felt like inside you.

A part of me wanted to go past it and leave or to walk the other direction, and I did just that. I started making my way to the bar, but not more than a minute later, when I looked over my shoulder, I saw that SUV following me.

My pulse was painfully fast now, and beads of sweat started to dot my flesh.

I would not let fear dictate my life.

I would not let the unknown make me a victim.

So I stopped and turned around, and I found myself taking steps toward the vehicle, closer and closer. It was stopped once more, like this ominous presence. And the windows, God, the windows were so dark I couldn’t see inside.

But before I could get to it, the car pulled away from the curb. I stood there in the middle of the road, watching as it drove by me, away from me. But I felt whoever was in the driver seat watching me. I felt their focus on me, even if I couldn’t see them.

No, this wasn’t a coincidence. This was someone watching me. But who? If it were Henry, then he wouldn’t be waiting. He wouldn’t be just sitting there watching me.

He’d act.

He’d have broken into my apartment last night and did whatever it was he was going to do. He wasn’t a man of patience.

I didn’t know how long I stood in the middle of the street, staring after the SUV as it disappeared around the corner. I stood there wondering what I was going to do.