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I pulled out my phone, my heart constricting when I saw the wordrestrictedflashing across the glass screen. I answered it with a trembling hand, and I was about to bring the phone to my ear when Brett snatched it from my hand and hit the speaker button so he could hear it, too. Only after that did he hand it back to me.
Holding the phone between us, a sense of dread crawled over me. “Hello?” Compared to how I sounded when I was talking to Brett, it was like night and day. I sounded scared, unsure, timid. It was a feeling only one other person had ever instilled in me, and maybe that’s why I struggled with the idea that the caller could be Zak with his voice altered.
Only one man had ever made me feel so helpless, a man I hadn’t seen since before I’d broken up with Zak, thankfully.
But now wasn’t the time to think about that, because my mystery man spoke, his voice mechanically low, “Charlie, who’s the guy? Because he sure can’t be a boyfriend of yours. We both know you don’t have a boyfriend.”
Though I stared up at Brett, I forced myself to say, “You saw us tonight.”
“Of course I did. You didn’t think I’d let you go to a party all by yourself, did you? Who is he?” On the other side, I could hear him breathing. Calm, slow breaths, the opposite of me right now. When I didn’t reply, he grew irritated. “Charlie, who the fuck is he?”
Zak would never talk like that—although, I’d never seen or heard him act so rude and brazen as he’d been tonight. Did I really know Zak? It’d been over a year. Long enough for him to decide he still wanted me, long enough for him to come to the realization that I wouldn’t want him back, so he had to stalk me from the shadows.
I closed my eyes, hating myself for what I was about to say. “He’s my boyfriend.” When I opened my eyes, a smug expression on Brett’s face greeted me, and I responded by giving him the middle finger.
“Do you think he can protect you from me?” A single question, but the more you thought about it, the more ominous it sounded. Though Brett’s instincts pointed at Zak, we had no concrete proof. He could literally be anyone.
Brett couldn’t be with me every hour of the day and night, so, no, he couldn’t protect me all the time.
“Charlie, you can’t have a boyfriend when you already belong to me,” my stalker whispered. “Soon enough I’ll make you see that.” And then he ended the call.
I shut my phone screen off and held my phone against my chest, feeling… some type of way. Bad, but that was an understatement. What would he do now that he thought I had a boyfriend? Would he try to kidnap me or something?
Shit.
“Hey,” Brett’s voice brought me back to reality. “Everything’s going to be okay. He has no idea who I am or what I can do. Charlie, we got this. Let him come. I’ll get him—”
“Can you sleep with me tonight?” I blurted the question out before I had time to rethink it. Let’s just say it was a good thing it was so dark out, because otherwise Brett definitely would’ve seen the heat creeping up my face after that. “I mean, can you sleep in my room tonight? On the floor. Not with me but… close?”
Brett was quiet for a few seconds, until he asked, “What about your parents?”
“I’ll lock my door. They won’t come in. They always go food shopping Saturday mornings, so when they’re gone, you can slip out through the back.” My fingers curled around my phone so hard I thought I might break the damned thing. “Please. I don’t… I don’t want to be alone after that call.”
I thought he might actually deny me, but in the end, he sighed and muttered, “Let me get my pillow and shit.”
As he moved away from me and headed to the ladder to the treehouse, I leaned my head back on the tree, trying to get my breathing under control. After what happened, what almost happened, I should say, it probably wasn’t smart to invite Brett into my bedroom, but I’d rather have him with me, close to me.
He might rile me up, might not know what personal space was… he might say some mean things—not to mention the fact that he was the most dangerous man I’d ever met—but I felt safe with him, safer than I’d felt in a long, long time.
God. How messed up did that make me?
Brett scrambled down the ladder with his pillow tucked under his arm and a blanket thrown over his shoulder. He shot me a look, and then I took him to the house. We went in through the back door and headed straight up to my room. Only when we were in my room did I make sure the door handle was locked and go to close the blinds on my window, and then I flicked on the light and turned to face Brett.
Standing in the center of my room, holding onto a pillow and an old blanket, he looked so out of place. I would’ve smiled if I didn’t feel so uneasy.
I pointed to the area beside my bed, saying, “You can sleep there. Do you… do you need anything else?” I spoke in hushed tones, not wanting to wake my parents.
Brett shook his head. He went to drop his pillow on the floor beside my bed, then laying down his blanket. “No, I’m fine. Are you sure you want me here tonight, Charlie?” He tossed me a look over his shoulder, but even the off-shoulder glance couldn’t lessen the anxiety I felt over what just happened.
In the beginning, I thought I could ignore it. Block, ignore, pretend it wasn’t happening. But it continued, it escalated—it was something I should’ve realized back then. It wasn’t the first time I’d tried to pretend everything was fine when it wasn’t.
“I want you here,” I whispered, an itch surfacing on my inner thigh. Before Brett, I’d been tempted to fall back to old habits. It was a strange thing, wanting to die and at the same time being afraid of death. I think it’s why I never cut my wrists.
I slipped off my shoes and wandered over to my dresser, pulling out my pajamas. Brett had sat down, though his blue eyes were on me, a certain twinkle in them, like he thought he’d get to see me change.
As if sensing my thoughts, Brett smirked. “What? I’d love a show before bed.” Making jokes to try to lighten the mood. I didn’t know, but like hell would I let him see me change.
Storming over to the light switch, I hit it, and the room fell into darkness. It was dark enough that he wouldn’t see anything. I turned my back to him and pulled off my sweater, replacing it with a baggy t-shirt, then pulling off my jeans. I slipped on a pair of fuzzy shorts, and then I moved toward my bed.
