Page 23 of Stalking the Bride

I’m fidgeting with my fingernails as he pulls up in front of the station. I can see a male officer sitting at the desk behind a sheet of glass, scrolling through his phone, a bored look on his face.

Get out, Belle. Go report the son of a bitch before he has a chance to escape!

I’m shaking like I’ve been out in the freezing cold for hours, and yet there’s still something stopping me from getting out of the car and racing up the steps to the uniformed man. But why? It’s not like Conrad and I have known each other for decades and I finally just discovered some awful truth about him. It’s only been weeks since we first met, and a couple days since things got really…personal.

So why am I hesitant? Why am I thinking back to what happened in the back kitchen at the manor? To how assertive he was with me, how strong he was when he held me in his arms? Why, at the same time that I’m thinking about leaving him, am I thinking about my life with him?

The man is a stalker! An unhinged liar!

It’s impossible for me to know what else he’s done and hasn’t told me about. And I want to know it all. All there is to know abouthim. He could have chosen any girl to do this to, but he chose me.

“Listen, girl, you gotta get out of my car now,” the driver says, clearly annoyed. “Or order another ride.”

“If you could just give me a second–”

“Out!” he shouts, shoving the rear passenger door open. “Now!”

“Okay, okay,” I mutter, dragging myself across the seat and stepping out onto the curb. Without a second’s hesitation, the man snatches his door shut and speeds off, leaving me standing beneath the cold blue of a street light, my eyes on the police station.

What can I actually tell them, though? That Conrad called in a fake bomb threat of which I have absolutely no proof? That he deceived me by pretending to protect me, while the whole time he was stalking me? Again, I have no way of proving that either. And was he never actuallynotprotecting me? He never let me out of his sight–that is, until I tricked him at the pier. And I did feel so safe around him…

My God, what am I even thinking right now?

My nipples are hard beneath my shirt. I’m still soaked from our encounter on the Ferris wheel. And despite the chill in the air, I’m flooded with heat. I take one more glance up at the officer behind his desk and think about how our conversation would go, then turn my back on him and pull out my phone.

“You are such an idiot, Belle…”

I scroll through my recent calls until I find Fitch’s contact. I hesitate. If I make this call, things will getverycomplicated. Not like they already aren’t, but this will change how the rest of my life unfolds. There will be no going back if I do this.

“What I can do is take you into the shadows behind one of these shops, pin you up against the wall, and put my cock back where it belongs–inside you.”

His words ring in my head, making me aware of just how badly I wanted that back at the pier. How badly I still want it. I feel like years have passed with Conrad. I don’t even know who I am anymore. My thinking is no longer rational. I’ve fallen for him, utterly and completely. But I’m also terrified by him.

So what do I do now?

I want to believe he won’t hurt me. In fact, Iknowhe won’t. But how can I possibly think that? Am I just being as naïve as I was when I first fell for him? Despite all my anger from being lied to, my fury for being manipulated, my fear from realizing he’s been stalking me, I still cannot resist his passion,his strength, his dominance that he asserted in the way he commanded me.

He makes me feel wanted. A feeling Fitch has never given me. A feeling my own parents have never given me, who are happy to sell me off like an old dairy cow. But none of this changes the fact that he lied to me. He hid who he truly was from me, and who knows what else he has yet to reveal?

He’s going to have to understand that.

He’s going to have to feel the way I feel now before I let him take me back. You can’t build a house on a weak foundation, and if Conrad and I are going to have any kind of relationship at all, we need a foundation that can hold the world.

I look down at Fitch’s name on my phone, take a deep breath, close my eyes, and press it with my thumb. He answers on the first ring.

“Hello, Belle? Is everything okay?”

I’m on the verge of a panic attack. But somehow I’m managing to keep it together.

No. Everything is not okay. But I keep my cool and even put a smile into my voice when I reply, “Everything is not okay.”

9

CONRAD

Everything is collapsing.

I’m a wild beast, foaming at the mouth, suffering with desperation, possessed by a singular, desperate goal: find Belle.

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