Page 12 of Inferno

She turned the screen toward me without speaking. I held her gaze for a long moment before I took the phone. The messages filled the screen, timestamped through the night, each one worse than the last.

Where the fuck are you.

Junie this isn’t funny.

Answer your phone.

I know you’re with that biker trash.

You’re making a mistake.

You don’t know what you’re doing.

Come home so we can talk about this like adults.

You’re being childish.

This isn’t you.

Who do you think you are?

You will regret this.

The last one sat at the bottom of the screen, sent at 3:17 a.m.

You will regret this.

I scrolled back up. Read them again. Took my time. The words weren’t complicated. They were the oldest script in the world, written by a man who couldn’t stand the idea that someone had walked away from him. Every message was about control.

I handed the phone back. My voice came out steady and calm when inside I felt that intense anger inside me sparking to life. I learned my lesson once about letting my temper burn hot. I didn’t regret my actions then. Now, I had the feeling, anything I did to avenge this woman should anything happen to her, would be infinitely worse than what I’d done in my previous life. “Block him, Juniper,” I said. She didn’t move. Her fingers were white around the edges of the phone. “Juniper.” I took a slow step forward and spoke softly, but forcefully. “Block. Him.”

As she looked up at me, her eyes were wide and afraid. I also saw the exact moment when she realized the person she trusted the most at the moment wasn’t the person she should trust, but someone she barely knew.

“I will,” she said. But her thumb didn’t move.

I took the phone from her hand. Opened her contacts and added my number before handing it back. “That’s me, Juniper. Day or night. If he so much as parks on your street, you call. Understand?”

She nodded. The phone went back into her pocket. Still buzzing. She ignored it. I probably should have blocked the motherfucker while I had it, but I didn’t have that right. And I fucking hated I didn’t.

I walked her to the driver’s door. She opened it and slid behind the wheel. The interior smelled like lavender and vanilla from the vent clip. A stuffed dinosaur hung from the rearview mirror and I grimaced. Twenty-one or not, Juniper was way the fuck too young for me in both age and experience. That fact and that alone made me back off when every instinct I had screamed at me to interfere and protect her.

I stood beside the car while she sat there with the key in the ignition. When she didn’t turn it, I leaned in slowly so I didn’t spook her. “You gonna be OK, birthday girl?” I asked.

She looked at me through the open window. The morning light caught the copper in her hair and the steel in her eyes. I could see she was scared, but being scared wasn’t the same thing as being beaten. This woman refused to surrender without a fight.

“I’ll be fine,” she said. “Thank you. For everything, Jonah Sherman. I truly mean that. I hope I see you again.”

I pointed to the phone sitting in the cupholder next to her. “Day or night, honey. I’ll come for you. No questions asked. You need anything at all. I’m here. You get me?”

She nodded. Turned the key. The engine caught. I stepped back from the door, and she pulled it closed. The window stayed down. Her hands settled on the wheel.

I walked to the gate. The prospect there saw me coming and hit the button. The chain-link rolled back on its track, gravel crunching under the wheels.

She put the car in reverse. Backed away from my bike. Then the sedan rolled forward, slowly at first, then gathering speed as she reached the open gate. The morning sun hit the rear windshield and turned it gold. Her taillights flashed once as she tapped the brake at the threshold. Then she was through. The car turned onto the main road. The engine sound faded.

I stood there and watched her taillights disappear around the bend. The morning was full and bright. Somewhere in the distance, a car horn honked. I turned and walked back toward the building. I’d wait for the call. I knew it would come. Because men like Brett didn’t know how to walk away.

Chapter Five