Chase pulls up to my house, fifteen minutes later. “So that’s Ember?” he says with a smug look on his face. I roll my eyes as I get out of the car. I had a dream about her once and said her name while I was sleeping. The guys had crashed at my place after a night out drinking, and they’ve fucked with me every chance they’ve gotten after that.
Unlocking the door, I turn on the lamp on the side table next to the door. “Yes, that’s Ember,” I say with an exasperated sigh. God,she looks amazing. She has grown a little since I'd last seen her sixteen years ago. She has a beautiful body—perfectly sized breasts that fit beautifully against my body, and my mind gets stuck, remembering her body pressed against me when I kissed her earlier. Her hips are curvy with a full ass and thick thighs. Perfect. She is perfect, and always has been. She was wearing a full face of makeup, but I could see her freckles still peeking through, and that beauty mark near her left eye that I’ve always wanted to kiss. I never did, because at sixteen it felt too intimate.
I walk into the kitchen, grabbing a beer from the fridge for myself and passing one to Chase.
“I wonder how hard it would be to find someone who doesn’t want to be found.” I talk to myself, staring at nothing on the wall across from me.
“What are you talking about, man?” Chase asks, squinting his eyes.
“Ember got pregnant after we broke up. The dude was a fuck up,” I tell him as I lean against the counter, my blood starting to heat. “I guess she broke it off with him right before she had the baby, and gave the baby up for adoption, and he’s been stalking her since.”
Earlier, when she’d dropped her phone and ran to the bathroom, I snagged her phone off the ground and saw what had sent her running. Hundreds of messages from UNKNOWN. All talking shit and degrading her. He was stalking and harassing her. She tried to play it off like it didn’t bother her, but it was clear that it was starting to take effect.
I kept seeing a date in the texts from him, clearly taunting her. November twenty-third. November of this year? November of the year they were together? I’d try and look into that.Was he planning something?My body tenses at the thought of Dean doing anything to hurt Ember.
Rubbing my hand down my face, I try to reign in my anger.
“I mean I'm sure it can’t be too hard, especially if he’s been arrested.” Chase shrugs his shoulders.True, and I know he had been, even when we were younger.
As much as knowing there would be a record to find more information about him made me feel better, it also made me feel unsettled because he clearly had it out for Ember.
Finishing his beer, Chase tosses it into the bin. “Alright dude, I’m heading home, love ya.” He heads out the door, shutting it behind him with a click.
Turning the house down, I head to my room and straight to the bathroom. I need to get out of my head. But as soon as I start stripping my clothes off, I start remembering the feel of Ember’s body against mine.
She was so soft and easy to lean into. My cock perks up at the thought of our bodies pressed against one another. I run my fingers along my bottom lip, the one that she loved to bite. She did that when we were kids, too. Blowing out a breath, I jump in the shower, letting the hot water beat down over my head and run down my body.
I chuckle, thinking back to when Ember was in the bathroom and I’d heard her say she’d been drooling over me. Based on the look I got when I answered one of her questions, she hadn’t realized she was using her outside voice.
A quick flash of her hand roaming up my chest while I kissed her goes through my mind and has me taking hold of my cock. Touching the tip of my cock, I smear the bead of precum down it, and start pumping it firmly before speeding up. I brace my other hand against the wall, letting the memory of the kiss fill my head as my strokes increase until I come, fast and hard.
Out of breath, and breathing heavily, I slump against the wall before washing my hair and body and then climbing into bed. I want to do a little detective work on Mr. Stalker before I pass out. I type his name and his location into Google, and immediately pull up a couple of mugshots with arrest records. I’d never paid for one of those stupid people find sites, but I was quick to autofill my information and pay for his record. I immediately feel sick to my stomach.
The record is twenty-four pages long. Obviously, some of it is just information; name, DOB, relatives, last known address, those sorts of things. His last known address was in Lincoln, and I’m not entirely sure that it still is. One of his messages to Ember tonight said he was only a few miles away, so maybe he hadn’t reported it anywhere. Combing through more of the document, I finally come to the arrest records, and I hold my breath while reading over them quickly. Assault. Driving under the influence. Battery. Rape. Intoxication in public.
My chest tightens, not knowing if any of these interactions had involved Ember in any way. Since it was a record, there were dates attached. Most of these had occurred after they had broken up. Landing on the rape charge, my breath stutters. It was while they would have been together. I wonder if it was Ember, or if it was someone else. I feel like Reed would have mentioned it if it had been Ember, but we had drifted apart after Ember and I broke up, so I’m not entirely sure.
I close the laptop, not feeling the slightest bit better about the situation. I lay there thinking about Ember. She is strong, no doubt. Giving up your baby, dealing with a psycho baby daddy, and still being able to smile. Sure, it happened fifteen years ago, but something tells me time can’t heal some things. Especially when a constant sick reminder follows you. I start drifting to sleep. Thinking about her, my pretty girl.
CHAPTER FIVE
EMBER
I stir in bed,feeling all the damage those Truly’s did the night before.
Groaning, I look over at the alarm clock and see that it's not even eight AM yet. I never made it to the shower last night. After I watched Harley pull away, peeking through the curtains, I went and sat on the corner of my bed, trying to calm the tension I'd been holding because of the texts Dean had sent that sent me spewing. One more message had come through, and while I wanted to tell myself I wasn’t scared, I couldn’t make myself strip and be in a vulnerable state in the bathroom.
I decide I’m going to call a security company today and get some sort of camera security system set up. Everyone always told me they were a scam, but the thought of being able to see when someone is coming or going makes me feel a little better.
I roll over, starting to doze back off, when I hear a knock at my door. I freeze. Atlas definitely would not be over this early, especially after she finally cut loose with her friends last night. I have a fewclose friends, but literally none would be caught dead on my doorstep before eight AM on a Sunday.
I grab my sweatpants, shoving my legs into the pants hurriedly, and pull on my plush robe, tying it tight to my body.
Tiptoeing to the door, I peek through the curtain and see a black leather jacket, dark blue jeans, and onyx colored hair. I let out a sigh of relief.
Last I saw, Dean was balding, so I know it isn’t him.
I unlock and pull the door open. With the door open, I'm met with brown eyes and a smile. “Hey, pretty girl, figured you would need food, but would wallow in bed as long as possible if you didn’t have anything.”
