Page 61 of Locke

It was something else.

I ignored Derek’s piercing stare and resumed my shift. I felt a rift between the old man and me. He was disturbed and probably questioning who the hell was looking after him.

The way my core tightened at the memory of Locke, I began questioning myself, too.

Eighteen

Kali

After work, I picked up some groceries and headed home, a little frustrated by the awkwardness that had suddenly developed between Derek and me.

I was a little worried he might fire me and there went 5 hours of pay a week I really needed. To play it off like nothing, I sent him a text with a smiley face: Hope you have a good night, Derek! Please let me know if you need anything =)

A few minutes later he responded with: K

Fuck.

I considered responding back when I slammed into a hard body and my groceries fell to the ground. Shit. Face flushing, I looked up at the man briefly before looking down at the gigantic mess I made, muttering, “Sorry.”

I dropped to the ground to collect the stray apples, cans and two-dollar meat pies. The man dropped down too, his jeans lightly brushing my tights as he helped put the items away. I kept shaking my head at him, “It’s okay! Really, it’s my fault.”

“We both made this mess, didn’t we?”

I tried to smile, but I was so stressed with everything.

Fucking Locke and then Derek, and now that K message and, ugh, I felt like I was wading through a fog and my thoughts were screaming in my ears that something very bad was going to happen.

The man loaded the items into the brown paper bag with me. His bulging bare arm came out in front of me, his large hand working quickly to put the ingredients to tonight’s cheap stir fry away. The second it was done he stood up and continued on his way.

I looked up at him, realizing I must have seemed ungrateful. “Thank you!”

He was already on his way, though, and boy was he tall. I checked him out quickly: baseball cap over a head of black hair, a white t-shirt that had sleeves stretched around his bulging biceps. Jeans—I swallowed a groan—jeans that made his ass look sculpted.

I’d rammed into a hot as fuck dude. Of course, I did. Just my luck. And instead of talking to him, I was thinking about a suited bastard that had practically fucked me against my will.

Although, okay, he didn’t do that, but, fuck, I had given him complete control over me.

I dropped down further, shaking my head to myself. What was wrong with me lately? I was acting like such a ditz. As I stood up, I scanned the streets, already hunting down the black car that followed me.

When I didn’t see it, I felt like I was going crazy.

*

“You okay?” Sylvia asked me when I trudged into the small kitchen and placed the bag of groceries down on the counter. My skin was coated in light sweat, my heart still speeding in my chest because this was fucking anxiety in a nutshell.

I nodded once. “Totes fine.”

“Totes?”

“Totally.”

“No, I know what it means, just…you don’t say totes unless something is totally wrong.”

When I didn’t answer straight away, she closed her laptop and stood up, eyeing me peculiarly. “You’re acting so weird, Kali.”

“Am I?”

“It’s like you’re a different person. You won’t even go out with me anymore.”

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