Page 85 of Unexpected

Nothing was ever a coincidence. Maybe Valerie had been trying to find me for a while, or she always knew where I was. If the latter was true, I’m sure it was Hazel that spurred her into action. The woman wouldn’t let me have a day of peace if there was another woman in the picture, hence my lack of relationships since our divorce years before.

“I didn’t put two and two together until just now. You have to believe me. I would have told you if I thought she had gotten ahold of my phone,” Josh pleaded, bracing his hands on the island between us.

“I know. I believe you, but now we have this to deal with.”

He hung his head, still shaking it in disbelief.

“What did she say? Word for word,” he asked.

I gave him a play-by-play of my entire conversation while he grabbed us both beers. He downed his in one go when I told him about the part of the call where she mentioned Hazel and then immediately popped open another one.

“Fuck,” he murmured halfway through the second bottle.

“Yeah, my thoughts exactly.” Behind Josh and through the small window above the sink, I caught sight of Becky and Chris arm and arm walking down their front porch steps. In the dimness of their porch light, I could see that Becky was dressed in a formal red gown and Chris was wearing a suit. But what I was most surprised to see was a very toothy smile plastered on Becky’s face.

“Talk me through what happened with Valerie,” I said, deciding that my neighbors’ fucked-up relationship would have to come after my own.

Josh cleared his throat and pulled out one of the barstools from around the corner of the island. “She approached me at the bar first and tried to say hi. Probably half an hour after y’all left. I told her to fuck right the hell off, and she disappeared, so I thought she had actually listened. Then I went to the bathroom and the bitch followed me. She got up in my face when I was trying to wash my hands. She was talking about how she knows we’ve had our differences, but I know deep down that y’all are meant to be together. I finally slipped past her and waved down the bouncer at the back door.” He adjusted where he perched on the stool and looked uncomfortable with retelling the story. “After I got back to the bar from dealing with her, that’s when I noticed my phone was gone. I thought I’d just misplaced it in the chaos of dealing with her. I’m not exactly sure how she swiped it, but it seems like the best explanation. I’ve deactivated the phone, and everything else that needs to be done, but I’m sure she probably got all the information she needed before I even realized it was missing.”

I nodded my agreement.

“So, what the hell are you going to do? Are you going to change your number?”

“No,” I said before I could really think about it. But I was tired of fucking running and doing exactly what Valerie wanted when she showed up once again. Changing my number, moving, it was all enough. I couldn’t let her continue to rule my life.

“Fair enough, man,” Josh said without needing an explanation. “But what about—”

“I don’t know.”

“How do you know what I was going to ask?”

I huffed out a humorless laugh. “Because it’s the only goddamn thing I’m really concerned about right now. I can handle Valerie, but I don’t want Hazel having to suffer from her psychotic bullshit just because she’s with me.”

I prodded my own finger in my chest just in case he didn’t get it.

“With you, huh?”

I waved off his question and grabbed myself another beer—the last one, too, which meant I was switching to the hard shit after it. “You know what I mean. Valerie’s always popped back up when another woman comes into my life, but anyone is fair game to her. And you know her, Josh. When she makes a threat, she makes good on it.”

Before the divorce was final, when I was living in the apartment that she made a living hell, Josh was a victim of one of her torturous tactics. She called him pretending to be a nurse and told him Zach and Samantha were both in the hospital after a horrible car accident. That he should hurry to the hospital if he wanted to say goodbye to his son.

Josh was staying the night with me at the time and woke me up in a panic. We broke every traffic law imaginable trying to race to the hospital only to find that Samantha and Zach weren’t there. But sitting in the emergency room waiting room was Valerie. I had to physically hold Josh back as rage-filled tears streamed down his face and he lunged at her again and again.

Then there was the incident with Blakely. While still living in that damned apartment, I hooked up with one of our friends. I was in the worst place I’d been since my parents died, and Blakely was willing to console me in more than one way.

We slept together three times total, and we both knew it wouldn’t be anything more than that. Still, when Valerie found out, she went ballistic. She called Blakely, constantly threatening to kill her in the most gruesome ways possible.

When Blakely consistently promised it was over, Valerie turned it down a notch and only sent weekly texts reminding her. It was possible Valerie was a little easier on her since they’d once been friends. Valerie had been friends with all of us. Our entire group had been together since the beginning of college.

No one was safe with Valerie around.

“So, what are you going to do, break it off already?”

The thought of leaving Hazel before anything got started made anger sweep through me, heating my veins to a dangerous level. My hands shook when I imagined having to tell her that it wasn’t working and slowly drifting away without a valid explanation. Because I couldn’t possibly tell her, then leave her, likely putting her in even more danger. My entire body vibrated because I could see her broken face. I didn’t want to break her, and I sure as fuck never wanted to cause her pain like her fuckface ex. The last thing I wanted to be was anything like him.

The rage was overwhelming, and it needed a fucking outlet, otherwise I felt like I was going to explode. I lurched forward and slammed my fist into the totally innocent refrigerator. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Josh jump off his stool, but I waved him off, letting my head fall to the cool, stainless steel surface.

It was stupid, and all it did was make my fucking hand hurt and dent the fridge. I didn’t feel any better, and I didn’t know what the hell I was supposed to do.

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