Chapter 41: THREADING DANGEROUS WATERS

MIA

"I want you to move everything out of your apartment." He said at breakfast.

I looked up from my coffee. "What?"

"Cancel the lease then move your things in here." He kept eating like he hadn't just suggested I erase the last physical evidence that I had a life before him. "It's just empty space now and you're not going back."

"I pay rent there."

"I'll cover it until the lease runs out if you can't cancel. We can put your furniture in storage and donate what you don't want." He reached across the table and covered my hand with his. "I want you fully here. I want everyone to know you're mine."

"They already do, don't they?"

"I want it official." His thumb moved over my knuckles. "You're here every night, your things are here, your work is here. The only thing that apartment still is right now is a way for you to tell yourself you could leave." He met my eyes. "I don't want you thinking about leaving."

That sounded odd but then he added, "I love having you with me and can't bear to ever see you leave or possibly get attacked by that stalker again."

He was right. "The stalker targeted me when I was alone."

"Exactly. When you were isolated and most vulnerable. If everyone knows you're protected — if it's clear you belong to someone who will come for them if they try anything — it will make them stay away forever."

He was right to an extent. I looked at him, he didn't know I was texting the stalker and it was best it stayed that way for now.

"Okay," I said.

He smiled and it made me feel warm as I smiled back.

"I'll help you move the last of it this weekend," he said. "We'll make a day of it."

He was true to his word.

First thing Saturday morning, he came with me to my apartment and helped move boxes, disassemble furniture and he practically did most of the work.

"This one?" He held up a lamp.

"Storage. My grandmother gave it to me."

"Then it stays." He set it carefully in the keep pile.

We worked through the afternoon and he paid for the storage room.

That night my phone buzzed with the unknown number.

"Bold move at the gallery sending those pictures. You've changed."

I was sitting on the bed while Dante was in the shower. I stared at the message and felt my heart race and also a tingle shoot between my legs.

"You've been taunting me for months," I typed. "I'm tired of being the one who's scared."

"So what are you now?"

"Curious."

A pause. Then, "About?"

"You. Why me? What do you actually want?"

Another pause, longer this time. "You already know what I want."

"Tell me anyway."

"I want you to stop pretending you don't feel what we've had for months. You want me as much as I want you."

My heart was hammering and my hands were unsteady. I stopped to listen and the shower was still running so I had a few more minutes before Dante came back so I typed, "what do you think I feel?"

"Come on, Mia. We both know you have fantasized this. Being watched by someone who you couldn't see. You want the thrill and fear but lately you've been trying to bury it under a false sense of feeling normal."

I swallowed. They were right but I had never told anyone this so I was shocked that they knew.

"You're wrong." I typed back.

"Am I?"

I just stared at it then another message came in. "I loved those pictures you sent last time. Send another."

My heart thundered in my ears. This was insane, reckless and dangerous. But I felt heat pool between my legs and couldn't pretend I didn't feel the thrill from this.

Just one more, I told myself. To draw them out and see how far they'll go.

My hands shook as I slipped the straps of my tank top down. Dante's marks were still there so I cupped one of my breasts, showing the marks then angled my phone and took a picture.

I sent it before I could talk myself out of it.

For a few seconds there was nothing and I was breathing too hard. My thighs pressed together as I felt myself get more wet.

Then the reply came. "Good girl."

I stared at the screen, heart racing so hard I felt dizzy as I imagined them watching me right now.

Then another message appeared. "Touch yourself for me."

I froze. Then the shower shut off and Dante's humming stopped. I quickly pulled my top back up, fingers fumbling with the straps, heart slamming against my ribs and my phone buzzed one last time.

"Good girl. I'll be watching."

I deleted the entire conversation with shaking hands, then shoved the phone under my butt just as the bathroom door opened.

Dante stepped out, towel low on his hips, water still dripping down his chest. He smiled when he saw me.

"You okay?" he asked, voice warm. "You look flushed."

I forced a smile, stepping forward to kiss him before he could read anything on my face. "Just thinking about you."

He pulled me closer, hands sliding down my back, completely unaware that my stalker had just called me a good girl while I stood here dripping for someone else.

And the worst part?

I liked it.

He pulled back.

"You look like you're thinking very hard about something," he said.

"Just tired from the move."

He pressed a kiss to my temple.

"I know today was a lot," he said. "Letting go of a space you've had to yourself is harder than just moving boxes."

"It's fine."

"It's okay if it's not fine." He shifted so he could see my face. "You can tell me when things are hard."

"Can I?"

He frowned. "What does that mean?"

"Nothing." I looked away. "I'm tired. I want to sleep."

He was quiet for a moment, studying me.

"You're mine to protect," he said finally. "That's not going to change. Whatever you're feeling about today, about any of it, I need you to know that I'm doing all of this because you're important to me. Because losing you is not something I'm willing to let happen."

I got into bed, turned off the bedside lamp as he got in behind me and cuddled me.

Is it cheating if it's with my stalker?

The last box I was unpacking was a small one with mostly camera equipment and random things. I was unpacking it while Dante was on a call in the other room and at the bottom, under a tangle of charger cables and the birthday card Yuna had given me last year that I couldn't throw away, were my spare keys.

I held them in my palm for a moment and considered tossing them out but then slipped them into the pocket of my camera bag "just in case."

If I want to meet my stalker, where would be a perfect place if not my old apartment?