Infatuated (16 page)

I slept great, for most of the night, but I woke up after a few hours with nightmares. Sensing it, Kale had pulled me closer to him and I’d managed to fall back asleep.

I had class in a few hours, but found myself wanting to skip it and spend the day with him instead. I wouldn’t, but maybe I could sneak in the shower with him before…

Grinning, I took off my watch and set it on his bedside table. I spotted my phone there. I’d asked about it a few times, to see if it was safe to take back yet, but he always distracted me with a look or touch. He was good at that. I sat on the edge of his bed and picked up my phone. I searched the history and found a few missed calls from my mom.

I pressed the preset for voice mail and put the phone to my ear. The blood in my veins ran cold when I heard the first message. My stomach revolted and I almost threw the phone—almost—but I managed to keep hold of it.

Kale came out of his bathroom wearing only a towel as another message played. His eyes darted to me, then the phone. I heard my mom’s laughing voice. “This is the wrong number again, isn’t it? Sorry, Kale. I’ll try her other number.”

I set the phone down in my lap when my hands started to shake.

“Ally…”

“I don’t even know where to begin with this, Kale,” I said through gritted teeth. “The fact that you’re hiding messages like…like that.” Just mentioning them had nausea rising up my stomach to the back of my throat until I could taste it. “Or the fact that you’ve been talking to my mother behind my back.”

“She kept calling one day, so I answered it. I was worried there was something wrong and I wanted to make sure, in case she needed you.”

“And the other thing? Is this why you’ve been avoiding talking about my phone? Why you’ve changed the subject anytime I’ve brought it up?”

“You left the phone with me, for this reason, so you didn’t have to deal with it, Ally.”

“Yes, I let you keep the phone. It should have been clear when I brought it up, numerous times, that I wanted to know what was going on. I assumed—incorrectly it seems—that you wouldn’t keep something like this from me!” By the time I finished the sentence, my control snapped and I was shouting. “You should have told me! He threatened to fuck me with—” I jumped up, covering my mouth as I ran to the bathroom. My foot slipped on water and I slammed my knee on the ground as I went down.

“Shit. Ally!”

He grabbed my hair as I hunched over. My stomach clenched painfully, until I was dry heaving. Shaking and sweaty, I closed my eyes, unable to move.

“Here,” Kale said, handing me a glass of water. He held it to my lips when I ended up sloshing half of the contents everywhere.

I rinsed my mouth and then set the cup aside. The throbbing in my knee had me pushing to my feet.

“Do you want some mouthwash or something?”

Unsure I could speak safely yet, I just nodded. My stomach was still stirring violently, though it was empty. When he handed me a cup of mouthwash, I gurgled and rinsed.

“You okay?”

“Fine,” I said, taking a step and crying out when my knee nearly gave out on me.

Wordlessly, Kale lifted me off my feet and carried me out to his bed. He lay me down carefully. “I’ll be back in a minute.”

I pressed the heels of my hands to my eyes and let out slow, deep breaths. Between the nausea, the increasing pain in my knee, and the phone calls, I was a wreck. Emotionally. Physically. And I was seething. At Kale. At Earl.

When I heard him come back in, I opened my eyes. “How could you keep those from me?”

He paused at the doorway for a moment before walking back to the side of the bed. He sat beside me. “I didn’t want to worry you, Ally,” he said, carefully setting a towel over my knee and then an ice pack.

“I had a right to know.”

“I wanted to protect you from them. I didn’t think you needed to hear…that or—”

“Or what?”

He muttered something under his breath and wrenched open the table beside his bed. He pulled out a small stack of napkins. I didn’t get why he had a bunch of napkins, or what they had to do with me, until I saw the bar logo. Until I saw Earl’s writing on them.

I took them but didn’t look at them. My stomach couldn’t handle anything else. “Where did you find these?”

“On your car.” Now he looked sick. “Inside your apartment door.”

“Inside my apartment?” I reeled back, mouth open. “He was in my apartment and you didn’t tell me?” Which explained why he’d been staying with me so much.

“No! God, no. Do you really think I would have let you stay there alone if I thought he’d been in your place? For fuck’s sake. He was shoving them under the door or leaving them on your windshield or mine almost every night. I didn’t want to add to your stress. I thought—”

“I don’t honestly care what you thought. You should have told me. I thought I could trust you. I thought I knew you better than that, Kale.”

His head snapped up. “You do.”

“Do I?” And that was just another kick in the gut, and maybe the biggest one of all. I put so much trust into him when I didn’t actually know all that much about him. “I know what you drive, I know you like football. I know what you do for a job and now where you live. You like chocolate. Other than that, I don’t really know that much about you, do I? You don’t talk about yourself at all, and what little I know of your past, I found out from your friends last night when they told stories about you.”

“It’s not important.”

“Isn’t it? I ask a question and you escape and evade your way out of answering with a quick smile or flirt. You’re a goddamn pro at it.” And that was something else I knew, I thought bitterly.

“What are you really mad about?”

“Everything. The calls, the notes. The rest.”

“We’ve only been together for a little while. What do you expect?” He shot up from the bed and ran his fingers through his hair. “Should I bare all my skeletons for you to see? Why complicate things with stuff that has no bearing on what we have going on?”

“Why indeed.”

“Where are you going, Ally?” he asked as I sat up.

“To uncomplicate things.”

He swore violently under his breath. “Why do women always do that?”

“Do what? Want to know about threats from a freaking stalker? Not a clue.”

“No. I get why you’re pissed about that one.”

“Ah, I see. The other thing. Well, I have no clue why
women
would want to know about the people in their lives. I have no idea why
women
would want to know such pesky details about the men they’re sleeping with and let into their homes. Men they let—” I broke off, thinking about last night, the things we’d done. The things I’d let him do.

No, that wasn’t fair. I was furious, but it was with myself more than him. We’d never done anything I didn’t want to do. He always asked and he never pushed. Ever.

I ran my hand through my hair. “Look, I’m sorry. This isn’t just about you. You’re an easy target because you’re here and yelling at myself is pointless. Don’t get me wrong, I’m angry with you, but I’m even more pissed at myself, because I let things get as far as they have without thinking about…anything, actually.” I thought only of him, day and night. I shook my head and laughed. “Just forget I said anything. I’m having nightmares almost every night and it’s wearing me down.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

The question made my teeth gnash together. “Why complicate things with stuff that has no bearing on what we have going on?” It was a low blow and I instantly regretted it, but at the same time, I had enough unknowns in my life. The last thing I needed was another one.

“What do you want to know, Ally?”

“I want to know I can trust you!”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the calls. I was—”

“I know what you were doing. I appreciate that side of it, really, I do, but… How did you think this would play out? Why did you think I wouldn’t ever check my messages?”

“I didn’t. I usually delete them as soon as I listen.”

I blinked at him, at a loss for words. How had this happened? Last night had been…great. Beyond great, really. And now this. “Did you forget what your friend told you? About making copies or saving them so I could report them to the police. If you’ve been deleting them—”

“I’ve already reported them. I wanted to keep the messages from you, not from the cops. I wouldn’t do something like that.”

Of course he had. And that just made everything worse and confused things even more. How could he be considerate and thoughtful enough to report them for me, but boneheaded enough to keep them from me? I wanted to hit him, then hug him. And then I wanted to hit him again.

How could I hold such a high level of opposing emotions? It shouldn’t have been possible. I didn’t know, and it was something I’d have to find out. On my own.

“Will you take me home, please?”

“Tell me how to fix this, Ally.”

“There are some things you just can’t fix with quick words and a smile, even you Kale. I just need a day or two to think.” I tossed the ice aside as I sat up again. “Are you going to take me home or do I need to call a cab?”

“Ally Cat…”

I looked away. “Just take me home.”

“Fine.”

I heard the frustration in his voice, and as much as I didn’t want it there, I refrained from saying anything. He grabbed the icepack from the bed and gathered my purse and keys for me. My manners were too ingrained and the “Thank you,” slid from my lips easily.

When I reached for my cell phone—my real one—his fist tightened. “You don’t need to take it, Ally.”

I looked up, noted the clenched jaw and dark eyes. I met his stare head on. “Yes, I do. I have to know,” I said, and then I limped to the door. I didn’t want to hear the calls, or get them, but I needed to know about them. Maybe not the exact phrasing, but I needed to know they were getting worse, didn’t I? I needed to be prepared, not kept in the dark. Having a Knight In Shining Armor was great—until he wasn’t there.

I trusted Kale with my life, but I needed to trust myself with it. And he did, too.

A
t my door, Kale tried to take the phone again but I stopped him. Frustrated, he tossed the ice pack in my freezer, told me to take something for my knee, and then he was gone. I went to my room and sat on the edge of the bed. My head and knee were killing me. My heart ached, for me and Kale. Hurting him wasn’t my intention, because even knowing his heart
was
in the right place, it didn’t make me feel any better. Right place didn’t unequivocally mean it
was
the right thing.

I took a hot shower, hoping the heat would help ease my knee, and some aspirin for swelling. After limping around my apartment for thirty minutes, I called Maxine to see if she’d pick me up for class.

“Did he hurt you?” she asked, eying me as I wobbled out to her car. “Cause if he did, I’ll kill him. I’ll chop off his man bits and feed them to the sharks. There were some spotted on the coast—”

“I fell, Max. Ease up.” And then I told how and why I’d fallen. I loved her too much to tell her what, exactly, the message had said, but I told her enough so she got the gist.

“Are you sure you want to go to class?” She frowned at me. “You look like hell, Als.”

“Thanks.”

She rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

I let out a breath. “No, I don’t want to go to class. I want to crawl in bed and sleep for a week, but I’m not going to. I don’t want to mess up my grades because I—”

“Missing one class won’t kill your grades. You’re a smart girl, you know that more than anyone.”

No, it wouldn’t. But I didn’t want to be home, either. I would be too busy taking notes in class to think about…everything else. At least that was my hope.

“Just drive, Max. I’ll be fine.”

Shaking her head, she pulled out of the parking lot and pulled onto the main road. “How did I end up friends with such a goody two-shoes?”

“Because I took awesome notes, even in middle school, and you needed the help.”

“Oh, yeah. You’re the brainy half.”

“You’re the pretty half.”

“And together we make the perfect woman,” we said together, then laughed like idiots. It was something we’d been saying for years.

When she parked and helped me out of the car, I said, “Thanks for picking me up, Max. I know it’s out of your way.”

“You’d do the same for me,” she answered with a nonchalant shrug.

“Of course I would.”

She grabbed my books and purse, then shut the door. “Ready?”

The glare of light flashed in my eyes. I blinked against it and turned my head to the side a fraction. Earl. He had something near his face—a camera, I thought—but quickly set it aside when he saw me watching. Instead of the usual stomach-dropping feeling that accompanied Earl-sightings, a fire burned in my gut. A hatred like nothing I’d ever experienced before.

Caution and fear forgotten, I let anger carry me forward. “What do you want from me?” I shouted at him, walking as fast as my knee would allow. “Stop following me, you sick fuck, and get a life! Want a picture of something? How’s this?” I flipped him off as Maxine grabbed my arm.

“Shit. What are you doing? Don’t antaga—”