by Jolie Day
When they took Emma for a walk, they held hands. It wasn’t a conscious decision, but rather one that happened on all its own. Lauren’s fingers had just been drawn to Marc’s, like some kind of magnetic force. Neither of them spoke about it, but Lauren couldn’t stop smiling as they walked down the beach together, Emma running ahead of them as Marc threw her ball with his free hand.
When they got back to the house, he took her against the kitchen counter, shoving up her skirt to find that she had forgone panties for the day. He’d growled and taken her mouth with force, much in the same way he’d pumped into her. She came with his lips surrounding her nipple, his thumb on her clit, and his hardness buried deep inside her.
After he’d lowered her back to the floor and smoothed down her skirt for her—giving her ass a firm squeeze—she’d smiled at the soreness she could feel with every step she took toward the shower.
She’d just gotten done washing her hair when he took her again, stepping into the shower behind her and pumping into her until her throat was raw with the screams of his name.
After that, things cooled down a little.
Lauren grabbed a novel from her bookshelf—marveling at how long it had been since she read an honest-to-god novel—and curled up on the couch while Marc got down on his hands and toes, doing push-ups. Lauren pretended not to watch him over the edge of her book, even as she bit her lip and reread the same sentence several times over. She couldn’t help the way her eyes raked over the tensing muscles in his back. She couldn’t rip her eyes away from the way they rippled and his skin glistened with sweat. She felt her breathing become shallow at a few points, but she tried to hide it with the book in front of her face, hiding her blush.
Or so she thought.
Marc ended up taking her once more before they got to dinner.
He cooked that night. Lauren didn’t trust herself using the stove when he was so close by that she could touch him whenever she wanted. She knew that he could do the same, but Marc was so much better at staying on task than she was. He was a lot better at so many things than she was.
She grinned kittenishly at the thought.
Their feet brushed under the table as they ate and Lauren tried her best to look away from him, her eyes on the plate in front of her. He’d made pasta; simple, tasty. The dish was good and she focused on spearing piece after piece, counting how many it took for her to finally look up at him. Every time she did, he was watching her in return and it took everything in her not to jump him right then and there.
She got halfway through dinner before they both gave in, moving toward the bedroom.
She didn’t know what was different about this day. What had made her finally decide to reveal how she felt about Marc Kelly. What had made him pretty much force her to do so. What was making them jump each other far more than they normally would. The electricity between them had been more intense today than any other since he arrived on his busted Harley Davidson. She wondered if it was because he felt what she did. If he felt the aura of danger that hadn’t left her alone all day, even when she was in his arms.
Did he sense what was coming in the same way that she did? Was he making every last second last the way she was? Did he want to prolong their pleasure for as long as possible, as she did? Would he stay when this was all over?
Yes, she decided. To all of it. She knew that he did, that he was, that he would. They were in this together and that wasn’t going to change when Jack was finally out of her life for good, when she’d stopped being afraid and running away from him.
They lay in bed for hours that evening. Then Marc sat up with a grunt.
“I should go,” he said. It was what he said every night, when it got too late for him to feasibly be there. He started to slip out of bed, but Lauren’s hand caught his shoulder.
“Don’t,” she said. He looked down at her, confused.
“You never walked through the front door,” she reminded him. “For all he knows, I’m still as alone as I was last night.”
“You don’t think he saw us walking along the beach?” Marc asked.
Lauren shook her head. “It’s private. The only way you could see onto the beach is if you’re in one of the houses on this street and I’ve seen all of my neighbors. Nobody is missing. He hasn’t seen.” Marc hesitated. “Please,” Lauren said. “Just stay.”
He nodded and lay back down next to her, their fingers linked as she draped herself over his side, her cheek on his shoulder. They were silent for a long time.
“We should put some clothes on,” he said. Lauren sighed in agreement. So, he did feel it. That sense of foreboding that told him something was going to happen tonight. Something bad or something good, she didn’t know. But it would include Jack. That was for sure. He was here. It wouldn’t be long before he arrived. And they would be ready for him.
*****
At around one, they were still waiting.
Lauren was half asleep, wearing a tank top and a pair of panties, laying on her back in the bed, her ears perked for the sound she knew was coming. With every passing second, she fell into a deeper sleep and she could only hope that Marc was more alert than she was. She could feel his pulse in his wrist. It was too quick for him to be asleep, but it had started to slow a bit. Every now and then, she felt him jump, waking himself up.
Her eyes closed on their own volition. She’d wanted to turn the lights on to keep herself awake, but it would have alerted him if he saw her waiting for him. She didn’t know what he thought she’d do. He knew she was helpless against him. He’d proven that much from the night they got married to the night he left these scars all over her body.
Still, they kept the lights off. Even if that made it harder to stay awake.
Her eyes popped open when she heard a click and she felt Marc rise from the bed, immediately, reaching for the gun in the bedside table and moving, quickly and quietly, to stand behind the door. She felt the floorboards in the living room creak and she reached under the bed for Emma, whose leash she had tied to the legs of the bed, keeping her there. The dog whined.
“Hush, Emma,” Lauren hissed and she was quiet. Lauren sat up against her pillows, folding her legs beneath her as she watched the door, waiting. She took a deep breath as she saw the knob turn and the door slowly creaked open, revealing a family profile.
It was him.
“Ah,” Jack said, in that deep, smooth voice she remembered with a chill down her spine. “There you are, sweetheart. I’ve missed you.” Lauren reached for the lamp on her bedside table and turned it on, illuminating the room.
Jack’s face appeared.
She could see his wolfish grin and those piercing blue eyes of his. They almost matched Marc’s eyes as he stood behind him. She forced her attention to remain on Jack, trying not to give the other man’s position or presence away.
“Did you miss me?” he asked, taking a step closer.
“No,” Lauren said, defiantly.
She prayed that Jack couldn’t hear the slight quiver in her voice that belied her confidence.
“Aww,” Jack said. “Too bad. I’ve missed you every day you’ve been away, just waiting for the day when I come and get you and bring you back with me.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Lauren hissed. “Just leave me alone, Jack. I’ve made a life here.”
“Oh, yes,” Jack laughed, bitterly. “And what a life you’ve made for yourself, huh? A town doctor in Vermont. So very different from the brilliant trauma surgeon you once were. Sad, really, how you decided to give all that up.”
“I didn’t decide anything!” Lauren growled. “You took it from me.”
“Oh, now, let’s not point fingers,” Jack tutted. “I’m not the one that called the cops and got my beloved husband arrested for nonsense.” He took another step toward her and Lauren forced her body to stay still, to not back away from him as he neared.
“It wasn’t nonsense!” she said. “You…you hurt me.”
�
�I punished you,” Jack retorted, looking bored. “And it was your own fault. You never listened to me, sweetheart. You were always so…defiant. You needed to be taught a lesson. A lesson which, by the way, I’m not done teaching.”
“Is that so?” she asked, though she was certain her voice shook that time. By the way he grinned, she was certain that Jack had heard it. “What… lesson?”
“How to behave,” Jack informed her, taking a seat on the bed. “How to be a good, loyal, obedient wife. That’s all I want. And then you can come back and live with me and we’ll be happy and in love, as we once were.”
“I have never loved you,” she hissed, getting back her composure. “I never will.”
Jack laughed, deep and almost hysterical.
“Oh dear, you are so naïve,” he said. “Of course, you will love me. Otherwise, I’ll have to hurt you again. And I don’t think either of us really wants that to happen again. It got so messy the last time.”
He reached out for her, but Lauren pulled away, hitting him with a glare. “How did you find me?” she asked. “That detective of yours?”
Jack shook his head. “Oh, heavens no!” he said. “Oliver was just a diversion. An actor, really. He was supposed to put up the red flags in your head; spook you a little, you know. Or excite you? Let you know that your beloved husband was coming back for you, to take you into his arms and—” He reached for her again, but Lauren boldly slapped his hands away.
“Oh, you’ve gotten tough, huh? Is that from shacking up with that disgusting biker of yours?”
“He’s not disgusting,” Lauren growled. “And he’s more of a man than you will ever be.”
“Is that so?” Jack laughed again. “You really think that?” She didn’t respond. “Oh dear, you really are stupider than I ever could have imagined, aren’t you?” He shook his head, chuckling. “You poor, poor, naïve child. You really think that you’ve found ‘the one,’ don’t you? You have no idea…”
“What … are you talking about?” Lauren asked, annoyed that she wasn’t in on some joke that he seemed to be having with himself.
“Who do you think sent Marc Kelly your way?”
At the sound of Marc’s full name on Jack’s lips, Lauren’s eyes widened.
“How … do you know his name?” she asked.
“Well, I tend to learn the name of a man,” Jack replied, “before I hire him.”
Lauren felt as if her entire world turned to rubble at her feet.
“Of course, I knew him as ‘Angelface’ when we met. Clever name for a man that will fuck anything in a skirt. He was in deep trouble with a friend of mine and I offered to bail him out for a little…favor. Watch over you, keep you safe, my dear little wife, and I would pay off all his debts and make sure that he lived like a king. It didn’t take much convincing for him to be on the road.” Jack grinned. “I’ve been tracking you since you left New York, you see, so all I had to do was give him an address and let him do the rest. I knew that you’d be helpless when it came to somebody in distress so I told dear Angelface to feign an accident with his motorcycle. I showed him how to fall in just the right way so that he wouldn’t break anything. I even replaced some of the parts on his Harley to older, more breakable ones. I, of course, had to promise to pay for the replacements after the deed was done.” He rolled his eyes. “But it was all worth it, because here you are. My little pet.”
Lauren swollowed the lump that had formed in her throat, after learning that the man she had just fallen in love with was not who she thought he was—not even close. No wonder he seemed to know when Jack would show up.
How could she have been so stupid.
Feeling the hot tears threatening to fall, she closed her eyes for a brief moment before realizing that Jack was still in front of her. Suddenly, her feelings of total dispair were replaced with a deep rage that she had never felt before.
“I’m not your anything,” Lauren growled, backing away. Jack just inched closer in response.
“I beg to differ,” he huffed. “You’re mine. Always have been; always will be. Though if I had known that you would open your legs for the first filthy mongrel that came along, I would have chosen much more wisely than I did. You really should get tested for STD’s once we get home, darling. You have no idea what that man is carrying below the belt.” Then, he laughed, suddenly. “Or, perhaps, you do.”
The slap across his face was altogether sudden and alarming, to the both of them. Marc even jumped in his spot in the corner, his eyes narrowing on Lauren as she continued to ignore his very presence. Jack’s head had barely moved with the force of the strike, but she could see a red handprint on his cheek where her skin had met his. He touched it with his own, checking for blood, before he lunged forward, wrapping his hands around her neck.
Lauren didn’t care at that point. She had nothing left to live for. Jack was going to kill her and Marc was in on it. He had been playing her the entire time, using her for a quick lay every time he felt like it. The truth was, as she knew all along, he felt nothing for her. He never would feel anything for her. She was just a job to him and anything he had told her otherwise had been a lie.
Her entire life was a lie…
Jack’s face invaded her line of vision. The psychotic anger that she had seen hundreds of times in her worst nightmares would be the last thing she ever saw. Perhaps this time he would actually go to prison instead of being let off with a slap on the wrist and a 500-foot restraining order. Perhaps this time he would see justice and her death would play a part in saving the next girl he would have chosen had he not found her. That was Lauren’s only comfort as she felt the world slipping away, as everything began to fade to black.
Then, suddenly, Jack’s entire body tensed and his hands loosened around her neck, falling away as his entire body slumped sideways onto the bed. As soon as she was free, Lauren began to gasp for breath, hurriedly taking each tiny bit of oxygen she could find into her lungs and trying to regain her consciousness as Marc ‘Angelface’ Kelly stood above her, the butt of his gun still held in the air. There was now blood dripping from it and hair stuck to the safety. Jack’s hair, she realized.
Marc Kelly had pistol-whipped her ex-husband, the same man that had offered him what was probably thousands of dollars to keep her still. To keep her from fleeing again.
But why?
“Lauren,” he said, but it sounded far away. The world was starting to fade again. “Lauren, are you okay?” He tucked the gun into the back of his jeans and shoved Jack’s body off of the bed, kneeling down in front of her. “Lauren! Say something! Can you hear me?” She couldn’t respond. She was getting sleepy; so, so sleepy. “Lauren! I’m gonna get you help. Just stay with me. Lauren…”
The world went black.
*****
When she woke up, Lauren’s head was pounding so hard that all she wanted to do was pass out again and never wake up. There was a familiar face above hers and she squinted her eyes as the woman smiled.
“Dr. Stanton,” she said. “It’s nice to see those eyes again. Can you sit up for me?”
Lauren nodded, then winced, allowing the woman—Marci was her name; an EMT—to help her up. Marci’s hand went up to feel her head, touching gently and massaging slightly.
“Your boyfriend says you lost consciousness,” Marci said, “after you suffered an assault at the hands of one…Jack Snyder? Is that correct, Doc?”
“Y-yes,” Lauren said. “I think so. Where am I?”
“You’re still at home,” Marci told her. “Well, almost. We got you into an ambulance in front of your house. The bruises around your neck look pretty severe, but they should fade within a few days. Are you having any trouble breathing right now?”
“No,” Lauren said, even as she coughed. “Not that much.”
“Yeah, that’s normal,” Marci assured her. “Of course, you already know that, being a doctor and all. But we’d like to bring you to the hospital for observation, you know? Your windpipe isn
’t crushed or anything, but you never know with these kinds of injuries. Would that be alright?”
Lauren shook her head. “I just wanna go home,” she said. “I have to…I have a dog.”
“I’m sure your boyfriend can watch the dog for a couple of days,” Marci chuckled. “You gotta take care of yourself right now, Doc.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” Lauren retorted.
“Excuse me?”
“The man you talked to? The one you’re referring to as my boyfriend? He’s not. He’s just…he’s not my boyfriend.”
“Oh, my apologies,” Marci said. “I just assumed since he’s the one that called 911 and carried you out here. And he’s been looking over here every other minute to see how you’re doing. I just assumed that you two were involved.”
“We were,” Lauren muttered. “But not anymore.” She took a deep breath and coughed again. Marci handed her an oxygen mask and she breathed into it for a couple of moments, before turning to the EMT.
“Where’s Jack?” she asked.
“He’ll be coming out in a second,” Marci told her. “Your bo—um, friend knocked him out with the butt of a gun. He’s giving his statement to the deputy right now if you’d like to go over and give your thanks.” Lauren shook her head, her gaze flitting to her front door just as it opened.
Watching Jack Snyder—the face of her nightmares for so long—be escorted out in handcuffs, blood running down the back of his neck, was gratifying. She was immediately filled with a sense of peace that nothing else would ever have been able to give her, she was sure of it. She grinned at him as he passed by and it felt as if she could breathe easily now, despite the purple, hand-shaped bruises that circled her neck. Jack glared over at her as she passed, but she was too elated to care.
He was finally going to get what he deserved.
“Well, if you’re not going to the hospital,” Marci said, “would you like help getting out of the ambulance?”
