Page 47 of Love Me Stalk Me
I toss my phone onto the bed. The mattress bounces slightly from the impact.
Less rage. More breathing.
My phone pings and I pick it up.
It’s her GPS signal.
She's on her way back to the store. The blue dot makes its way across the city map, heading away from the restaurant.
I know why she's coming back.
Evan's dropping her off like an obligation, like he checked a box, and now she has to go get her car.
Because of course, he wouldn't offer to drive her home. And, he's definitely not spending the night in Hoboken where she lives.
Fuck, if she were mine, I'd spend the night.
And we wouldn't be sleeping.
I'd have her spread out beneath me, hips under myhands, soft and warm and made for me to hold onto. I'd take my time, make her beg, make her whimper, make her forget every single shitty thing that asshole has ever said to her.
My cock goes stiff at the thought, the image too vivid, too fucking real.
I close my eyes, exhaling hard. Nope. No. Stop that thought.
She's not mine.
But goddamn, I want her to be.
And that thought hits me harder than it should.
Because I don't do this.
I don't get attached. I don't let myself.
Not after what happened to me.
Not after I came home to find the woman I thought I was going to marry had already moved on. Had wasted no time replacing me with some asshole—one who had never been deployed, never left, never had to wonder if he'd come back in a body bag.
Not after she married him before I even finished unpacking my rucksack.
That had been my final lesson on trusting women.
And I thought I was over it.
I thought I had burned through whatever part of me still wanted things like companionship, love, a life that didn't feel like an endless string of late nights and bad decisions.
But then there's Izzy.
And somehow, she makes me feel like maybe?—
That could change.
I sit there, breathing through it, reigning myself in, forcing my focus back. The cool air of my apartment raises goosebumps on my skin as my body cools down.
I pull up the security feed. The feed sharpens, and there she is—Izzy.
She walks fast, too fast, like she's trying to outrun something.
