Page 12 of Lock Me Out

The satisfaction is unreal, the act of slicing into something like this. I can’t help but do it to a second tire before moving on to the other two, chuckling to myself when I think of how surprised she’ll be when she comes out to find that little gift. One day, she’s going to regret the things she says.

I genuinely hope I’m the one who makes her regret it.

There’s something satisfying about sliding behind the wheel of my car. Of course, it’s nothing like what I’m used to—late model, no frills—but it runs. If I want to make sure Leni is safe from Deborah and people like her, I can’t keep going around on foot. Nothing matters more than that. According to the last email Colt sent me, it doesn’t seem like he knows the first thing about what’s going on in her head. But I do now, and the thought sends another rush of satisfaction washing over me. I know something he doesn’t. I can help her, try to make up for all the harm we caused.

Taking a shortcut, I’m in time to see Leni get out of Piper’s car and hurry into the apartment building where she lives with Colt. My hands tighten around the wheel as I imagine what goes on in there. The life they live together. A life I can’t be part of.

For a second, it almost seems like a good idea to get out of the car and go up there. I mean, Colt doesn’t believe I’m dead anyway. It wouldn’t come as a huge surprise to him.

But it would to Leni. How can I explain it?Sorry, I figured it was better to stay away so I wouldn’t hurt you anymore? Because all I want, all I crave, is the pleasure of your humiliation?

This isn’t the same as the shit Deborah pulls. We are not the same person; our needs do not come from the same place. I would never do anything to embarrass or hurt Leni in front of other people, and if my thoughts tonight are any indication, I would happily kill anyone who would try to make her feel small or less than. I would happily be her protector until the day I actually die.

But humiliating and using her one-on-one? In private? That is an entirely different story.

I need to get out of here now. The temptation is too much to resist, and I have already resisted it for months. I don’t know how much longer my self-control can hold up. Being this close to her is only making it harder for me to stay away. It’s for the best that I stay away. I’m doing her a favor.

Maybe I’m just like Dad, after all. I must be. Why else would I drive around imagining all the filthy, vile things I would do to Leni if I had the chance now? I know it’s wrong. I know it would really hurt her in the end. But I can’t stop thinking about it. I can’t.

I know I should, but my mind keeps coming back to the memories. Being inside her—so tight, sometimes to the point of resistance, but I always worked my way inside, didn’t I? Eventually, she always succumbed. Even if her mind didn’t want me, her body did.

Those memories are all I have to go on now, being in solitude the way I am. They’re not the pleasant sort of memories a normal person would look back on. Memories of good times, laughter, happiness. Warm memories of being together. No, I’d rather replay every one of her pained grunts, every one of her groans as she sucked my cock with tears running down her face and saliva dripping off her chin.

I must be exactly like him. Unfixable, broken for good. Maybe it’s in my genes, something I can’t change. Maybe I’ll have to fight against this forever… unless I give in. I could find someone. A prostitute, maybe, some whore who’d be willing to let me do whatever I want so long as I could rid myself of these terrible cravings. It would be easy, and I have the money.

But it wouldn’t be Leni, so it wouldn’t be the same. I’d probably only end up more frustrated than I was in the first place. No,this is my hell. This is my punishment for what I’ve done to her. Spending the rest of my life wishing I could do it again, caring too much about her to let myself do it.

It’s almost enough to make me want to hit the gas pedal hard. To tear down the street and turn the wheel once the right wall or tree came into view. It’s either that or accept the fact that this is my fate. Living in limbo for the rest of my life. Wanting, but not being able to touch. Yearning for something that I know is wrong and should never be.

“Fuck you,” I whisper, and I’m not sure who I’m talking to. Myself? My fucked-up father who made me this way?

A glance to my right reminds me there’s something else I planned on doing tonight, when it would be late enough that I could get away with it. A bouquet of lilies on the passenger seat. They were always Mom’s favorite.

Thinking of her goes a long way toward calming the worst of what’s raging in my soul. How can I sit here and think along these lines when she has suffered so much? What would she think of me if she knew the fantasies that run through my head almost constantly?

Colt said in his email he told her I was only away, so she won’t be too shocked if she wakes up and finds me in her room. I’ll do everything I can to make sure she doesn’t, though, because then there would be the matter of what happened to my face. I couldn’t explain that without having to explain a lot of other things I’m not sure she could handle—not to mention the time it would take. I need to see her for myself. That’s all. After so much time, all the years thinking she was gone forever, I want to see her again. To be in her presence. Maybe the broken, evil part of me will heal somehow.

And maybe I’m a child who still believes in fairytales. Maybe I don’t even deserve the comfort of her presence.

The hospital won’t be fully staffed at this time of night, meaning it should be easier for me to slip in unnoticed. That’s how I managed to escape my hospital in the first place, sneaking out at night when the floor was only half-staffed, if that. I don’t understand why hospitals are like that. Do they think people won’t have emergencies at night?

Whatever. Right now, it fits my needs. I park a few spots down from any other vehicles and get out with the lilies in hand, my hood raised, my chin tucked close to my chest. In a pair of jeans and nondescript shoes, I could be anyone. There’s no way of identifying me on any camera that might pick me up.

One thing I learned when I was a John Doe: act like you know where you’re going, and nobody will pay attention to you. That doesn’t mean I’m not careful—using the side entrance to the cafeteria to get inside the building rather than going through the front doors, where the security person on duty would definitely ask why I’m here.

It’s dead down here, the cafeteria closed, which is another thing that sort of baffles me. What, people don’t get hungry or thirsty during the night? What about the doctors and nurses? Don’t they deserve to eat?

Whatever. It works for me now as I walk quickly down the hall, my shoes soundless against the linoleum. The elevators further down the hall lead straight up to the various floors, giving me the opportunity to bypass the front desk. I’m glad Colt remembered to tell me where she is. He’s known all along I would have to see her. It doesn’t matter how much time we spend apart. He knows me too well.

The ICU floor is quiet, with a single nurse currently on duty at the desk and another couple of people in scrubs going from one room to the next. All it takes is waiting for the phone to ring and the girl to turn her back. I dart down the hall, Mom’s room number running through my head, not coming to a stop until I’m inside and behind the curtain that gives her at least a little privacy from the people walking by.

There she is. Sleeping, the TV on with the volume turned down low. Some random 24-hour news station is playing—without thinking about it, I find the remote on the table next to her bed and change it to something she’d like better. There’s an old movie playing, one of those black-and-white romances she used to watch sometimes. I leave the flowers beside the remote, knowing somebody will probably take them away but hoping she’ll see them before they do.

She looks good. Better than I imagined. What did I expect? Tubes coming out of her, a respirator, that sort of thing. But no, she’s breathing on her own. There are thin streaks of gray in her hair—she would’ve hated that, would’ve colored it the second her roots started showing. I want more than anything to reach out and stroke her hair, but I know better than to wake her up.

As it is, every second ticking by on the clock is one second closer to being discovered.

But she does look good, clean and cared for. Not that I had any doubts about that. Colt would kick the shit out of anybody who dared not treat her like a queen. At least he was here to do that for her if I couldn’t be.

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