Page 92 of In Love with the Devil

My eyes snap open at his callousness. He’s playing with me, enjoying my fear, just like Julian. I don’t need another sadistic asshole in my life. The rage rises in me like a volcano that has been sleeping for three years and can no longer wait. I slap him, dig my heel into his shoe, then knee him in the balls.

“Fucking please!” I yell.

He's busy holding his balls, coughs, and laughs. “I can tell already that you’re gonna be my wife.”

“Yeah. When hell freezes over,” I yell as I bolt out. Once outside the room, I press the elevator button but run to the stairs. One floor below, I cross the building to the other elevators and take those all the way down.

Chapter forty

Time and Space

Julian

Three years ago

Time and Space… She came back once. She'll do it again. She's mine and despite her cute but annoying bratty stubbornness, she'll accept it soon. We belong together,it's what I kept repeating to myself for three weeks after she abandoned me in that hotel room. She'll never know I acted like a broken hearted puppy, begging her to come back to me while sitting in the in the hotel lobby, slowly breaking down in silence, wondering when I'd see her again. I'll never tell her how my sanity once again shattered without her in my world, having to go to work, wear that infuriating mask only to go home to nothing.

By the third week, I knew if I didn't check on her, I would soon lose my mind so I cracked the code to the cameras at her job.She wasn't there. Then I checked the street camera by Mindy's house, not there either, but Mindy did still live there. But Astoria was nowhere to be found so I broke into Mindy’s house and connected to her personal laptop to have full access. Astoria video-conferenced with Mindy that very night. It only took a few minutes to gather where she was calling from.

If only she knew the relief that coursed through my every veins at the sweet, lovely sight of her. She looked like a different person, so happy and relieved. At first, all I wanted to do was choke her, stab her, and whip her to death. How could she be that happy without me when here I was, withering away without her?

Self reflection is an uphill battle. I had to admit to myself how hard I'd been on her for her betrayal. Maybe I'd taken it too far. Maybe I hadn't given her enough reasons to love me. I took communication classes for couples, read books likeThe Five Love Languages, and therapy to control my temper. Surely she'd appreciate how great and painful my efforts were.

Immediately after discovering where Astoria was, I told Kristin I was closing the clinic and connected her to the job she wanted. I collected as much of the equipment from the clinic, planning to open another in Tulum, Mexico. Once I arrived, I bought the house and focused on getting everything in order, including refurbishing the basement, an examination/operation room full of the proper equipment for any emergency. I discovered my love language wasacts of servicesso I embarked on finding her father.

It took me two years to find the asshole. I kept having to fly in and out of Mexico chasing after him. He'd changed his name andkept moving from state to state, only slowing down after his wife gave birth to their third daughter. It didn’t help my rage that the wife was an eighteen year old girl he’d brought from Honduras. He was thirty years her elder. She was barely of legal age and didn't know a lick of English. He might not have had her in his basement but shewashis prisoner.

One thing I’ve always known is that men like him and I… we never kick the old habit. I didn’t lie to her in the hotel bar. It’s a disease, and society encourages us to relapse. As a predator, I’ve always known what prey looks like, how it walks, smells, and talks. It’s how every cell in my body knew Astoria would be perfect for me before I even saw all of her face. I smelled it. I could see it just n the way she blinked.

In the end, she put a heart inside this soulless body and made me grow some empathy. I didn’t only need her back to torture her, a different hunger had grown. But I will not sugarcoat how this began or how dark it still is. So, when I stalked him and his “family,” and I saw those little girls' eyes, I knew. I knew what was happening just by how that three-year-old walked, with her head always down, as if a giggle had never come out of that body. My blood boiled, because I saw my pretty bird in her. My poor Astoria.

I have no problems acknowledging the sick bastard I am, but I would never harm a child. Maybe it’s because I know what it’s like to be a kid and be harmed by the ones who are supposed to love me.

So, when I saw that little child’s face… I kidnapped him that very night, drove him across the border and threw him in my basement, only feeding him enough to barely keep him alive. Inever spoke to him. Every time I remembered how she trembled and cried after telling me what he and his disgusting wife had done to Astoria, I'd beat him up til he was good as dead. Kristin ended up teasing me, asking if I had joined a fight club because of my raw knuckles.

I couldn’t wait to show my pretty bird what I had hunted down for her but I practiced self-control and left her alone. I only visited her late at night, once a month, never touching her. Her cats loved me because I fed them the best fish in town, every time. They’d eat so much they would have no choice but to sleep off the gluttony. Meanwhile, I'd sit and watch her sleep. I couldn't help smile when she'd start mumbling about statistics and her weird number theories. Often, she enjoyed keeping me there all night. I couldn't leave until she would say my name. Sometimes she'd make me wait until I had tears in my eyes, thinking she'd forgotten me. Sometimes she'd only say it when she was about to wake up. It was the equivalent of sweet fucking torture.

Chapter forty-one

Like Home

Astoria

The next morning after Sebastian forced a kiss on me, I find a dozen white roses with a small card on my desk. I roll my eyes at the apology, take the whole thing and throw it in my trash. The sound of the glass vase shattering replaces silence. My favorite flowers are the Himalayan blue poppies, you asshole.God's gift to humanity, I remember Julian drawling one day while we sat under the almond tree. He had corn poppies but once I looked them up I decided Himalayan’s were the version I liked.

Go to hell,I say through my teeth at both of them, place the trash can outside and get to work.

It's like this every day now. White roses and an apology. Always the same pathetic words written in Sebastian's handwriting. By the end of the week, there are so many that I end up having to place them in the lobby.

"Hey." I lift my eyes to find Cristian at the door.

"Hi. Is it lunch time already?" I ask, confused that he’s here.

"No, but do you think you can settle your war of the roses with Sebastian?"

"No. Fuck him," I grumble. From the corner of my eye, I see Sebastian at the door. I see Cristian’s shocked expression. This wasn’t a set-up.

"Right. I should go," says Cristian as he rushes out.

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