Five fucking months in the goddamn Pine Barrens. Alone. In a tent. Living off fucking energy bars and cans of beans.
By the time I finally came across the hammock he had slung up between two trees with a small fire a few feet away to ward off the early spring chill, passed out like he hadn't a care in the world, I hadn't exactly announced myself gracefully.
I had stalked up, overturned the hammock, and knocked him on his ass.
We went a few rounds, both of us taking a solid beating.
Then I offered him the job.
But there was a condition.
He had to have a place. An actual building with actual running water and electric and protection from the elements.
Because, apparently, there was no one in the world better at holding a prisoner than Ranger. No one could sneak out on him, manipulate him, distract him, guilt him.
It was what made him so good at what he had done in the military.
And why he hated himself and the world because of what he had done.
Why he hid himself in the woods miles away from other people.
It took a lot of convincing to get him to agree, to do something he never wanted to do again. But, in the end, when he realized that all he had to do was babysit, not interrogate, not torture, not eventually put a bullet in someone's brain when they ran out of intel, he set to building his house, getting his life a little more on track.
But it wasn't just the little acre or two that he had built and farmed on that he considered his.
The whole place was.
His to guard, protect, patrol.
"Quin wouldn't take too kindly to you burying bodies all over this place."
To that, Ranger's lips quirked up. "Usually doesn't have to go that far."
"Usually," I qualified.
"There's a lot of land here. Quiet land. Land where evil men think they can do evil things, and never be found out."
I didn't doubt that.
If you were looking for a place to torture, kill, and hide someone, there really was no better place. Especially in the off-season, when no one was hunting or camping.
"So you make sure they pay for it."
"Nina could work as a cadaver dog if she didn't try to rip your limbs off when around people," he said, waving a hand toward one of his Rotties. "She sniffed out a fresh kill last year. Woman was abused in ways that even men like us," he said, meaning ones who had served in the uglier areas of the service, "would feel sick to see. Body was barely even stiff. Deep in the woods. There was no way he got out that fast."
"So you found him."
"Found him," Ranger agreed with a nod.
"Did you find him first, or did the dogs?" I asked, feeling my stomach roll at the idea of that pack of dogs coming at you with bloodthirst on their minds.
"A mix," he told me, throwing back another round. "Let them play for a minute before I took him out of the world."
"You come across a lot of bodies here?"
"Nah. I mean here and there. Had a suicide last year. Had to get the law involved on that one. But maybe every ten or twelve months."
"That's a lot," I clarified.
"In one-point-one-million acres?" he shot back. "Not really. Murder rate isn't exactly low in the States, Gunn."
"Yeah, but in cities. In places where people are packed like sardines. A murder every ten months out here where no one lives is a lot."
To that, I got a shrug.
Then no one spoke for another fifteen minutes as we both drank, got lost in our own heads, as men such as us were inclined to do.
"Kai said you got a farm out here now," I broke the silence a while later when my thoughts took a turn I couldn't let them.
"Yep," he agreed, filling my glass. "And if you're staying, you're working," he informed me.
Those were the rules.
So, the next morning, after way too many goddamn glasses of whiskey the night before, I helped feed, water, muck out, collect eggs, anything that had to be done.
Then I got up and did the same the next day.
And the next.
And the next.
By the time I was finally ready to leave, focused enough to hopefully be able to get back to the real world, back to work, back to my life, I had been there for ten days.
It wasn't until I got back to my car, plugged in my phone to let it charge, and started driving that it happened.
A ding.
A voicemail.
Just one.
The office clearly hadn't missed me.
And the number wasn't one I had saved.
It wasn't one I was familiar with at all.
But when I stopped in the middle of the backroad and hit the button to play it, the voice was one I sure as shit remembered. It was the voice I had been trying to forgetful the past ten days, throwing myself into hard manual labor, avoiding the world, trying to stay away from anything that might trigger the memories.
But it was her voice.
And it was not good.
It changed fucking... everything.
I had something I needed to handle.
TWELVE
Sloane
The plan was simple.
Take it, fold it up, compartmentalize it, don't harp on it.
It was how I handled all the ugly bits in my life.
Locking it away.
Refusing to open it up.
I was good at it, too.
I'd had many years of practice.
And there were many things now to try to focus on. I had an apartment to make my own, shops to explore, restaurants to try, local attractions to see, work to find.
The first day, I'll admit, that was rough.
I walked around with his touch still pressed into my skin, my lips still swollen and sensitive from his, my muscles aching in places I hadn't used in far too long.
It was impossible for my brain not to go back to that bed, to the sensations and the feelings being with him had brought up.
Sometime around noon, I had forced myself to take a shower, convinced it would help to try to 'wash him off' of me.
It didn't work, of course.
But it was worth the try anyway.
The file sat there on my counter taunting me until I thumbed through it, taking out the job ads Jules had found, then finding a single loose leaf page with a phone number scribbled across it.
His, I was sure.
The temptation was strong then, to dial it, to tell him to come back, to be that needy, pathetic woman that I didn't want to be.
But I couldn't be her.
So I threw the file up on the highest shelf in my closet, one that was so high that it was clearly meant to keep things you never wanted to see again.
And I tried to move on.
I got permission from Andrew to paint my walls, with the strict orders that I would need to paint them back before I moved out.
'Back.'
As though faded-by-time-white was an actual color.
But whatever.
It gave me something to do. Take my car to the home improvement store, hem and haw swatches until my eyes started playing tricks on me, get supplies, then coming home and watching Youtube videos on the spotty wi-fi that came with the apartment buildings since I couldn't get hooked up myself for another week on how to paint a wall.
Yes, I needed to Youtube that.
When I was poor, spending money on paint was frivolous and unnecessary. And when I had finally 'made it,' I figured it made more sense to hire someone to paint for me.
It never occurred to me before how little I knew how to do for myself.
I had needed to ask Andrew to help me bracket my TV to the wall, to help me fix my toilet that had a tendency to run for no reason. I had to look up how to find a stud to hang a shelf, how to use communal laundry machines, to pump my own gas. All this little life stuff that had never really been part of my reality before was suddenly something I had needed to figure out on my own.
It was e
nough, here and there, to keep me occupied, to keep my mind from wandering, to keep things locked down as tight as I wanted them.
It was at night when it happened.
When my defenses were low.
When my desires were high.
When my body wanted me to remember.
When my heart wanted me to as well.
My dreams were fraught with one of two things - nightmares about Rodrigo Cortez... and vivid dreams about Gunner. Both made me wake up sweating, heart pounding, twisted in the sheets. For very different reasons.
I woke up exhausted, frustrated or scared, or a mix of both.
It was only three days before I couldn't take it anymore - the having no focus. There was only so much sketching I could do before my hand started to hurt, only so many books I could read before my eyes went swimmy. Only so many failed attempts at baked goods before I lost my enthusiasm to try.
It was time to get a job.
The options weren't exactly ideal. I mean, this was not the fashion capital of the world. There was nothing even resembling a high demand for designer handbags. Not that I could really go into that business again anyway. But I was hoping for something similar.
The only options Jules had found even remotely in my field were in fashion retail.
I hadn't worked in a store since I was a teenager, and even then, only fleetingly.
But I had to work.
I didn't just have one resume, either. I had three separate ones to choose from - one geared toward different sorts of jobs from office work to retail. I chose the one most suited toward retail, went in for an interview at a local big box store, and got a job.
Not in fashion.
In fact, I didn't even get to work in the clothing department for the first few days at all.
But I did get to work in electronics. And the garden center. And home goods. And the register.
Everything felt foreign to me, from learning how the system worked to knowing what the difference was between 4k and 4k Ultra, to the short lunch breaks, to the bathroom breaks that were actually limited to clocking in and out.
My feet hurt.
I used to spent ten, twelve, fourteen hour days in heels at my office. But even that hadn't prepared my feet - my sneaker-clad feet - for what it would be like to work in a store for a simple eight-hour shift. Blisters upon blisters. An ache that moved up my calves to my behind to my lower back.
I went home with every part of me feeling like it was throbbing, with headaches from the harsh overhead lights, hungry because my lunch break wasn't long enough for me to finish even half of my food, drained from having to smile and be pleasant to customers who were rude and irrational.
It was draining in a way I didn't know existed.
And then, oh yeah, I got to meet my manager.
The funny thing about men like him is, you get a vibe. Even before they come your way, before they rake their eyes up and down you, before they open their mouths.
Their presence makes you feel slimy, makes you look around to make sure someone is within screaming distance. Something within you just recognizes something within them.
That was how I felt when I met Mathew Henderson.
He was maybe in his early fifties with sandy hair that was starting to mix with white at the temples, though it blended in enough that you likely never would have noticed if it weren't for the godawful lighting that - despite having the best brands money could buy to cover up such things - made my dark under eye circles show under the makeup. His eyes were a bright blue. Not like the sky, but rather almost cobalt. Striking, really. Most people would kill for eyes like that. It was a shame they belonged to him.
Unlike the rest of us who had to wear khaki pants that were universally unflattering and a bright blue polo shirt with a lanyard hanging from our necks with our names on it, he got to wear what he wanted. And what he wanted was typically a pair of poorly fitting slacks in varying colors worn too high on the waist, making it look like he had two tummies instead of one, a belt that did not match his shoes, and dress shirts that were too long in both the hem and the sleeves, but also somehow too tight around the center, a combination that should not have been able to happen, but did regardless.
He walked up to me as I stocked a shelf with towels, getting too close, his breath actually on my skin as he spoke to me, telling me how glad he was to have me on the team, how excited he was to be working closely with me.
And as he moved away, his pelvis brushed along my butt.
Maybe it was a mistake due to a narrow aisle, but I just had a feeling about it.
Then the next day, he told me that if we became closer, he had a chance for advancement, that girls like me didn't belong stocking shelves.
The day after that, he caught me in a corner over by the toys and asked me out.
I refused.
And that was when this job went from bad, but tolerable, to awful.
My shifts got switched around, one day early morning, the next graveyard. My work was criticized endlessly. I was written up publicly, belittled when no one was around to hear it.
By the time my tenth day came, I was done.
So, so done.
I had never quit a job before, always doing the right thing, always giving my notice.
But I had barely gotten any sleep in over a week between the swing shifts and the dreams and nightmares. Every inch of my body hurt from being on my feet so much. My emotions felt yanked all over the place.
And all I could think was... I just can't do this anymore.
I got home and attempted a new recipe that ended in ashes.
I tried to draw, but couldn't get anything right.
And I felt alone, so freaking alone, more alone in the world than I had ever felt before.
It was easier before, when I had something in my life to be proud of, a career I was dedicated to, that people respected me for.
It wasn't friendships or family or love.
But it was something.
Here?
I had nothing.
Not a damn thing.
So I did something I promised myself I would never do out of sadness, loneliness, fear, or anger.
Like my mother always did.
I fell into a bottle.
Deep.
It wasn't until I finished my second bottle of wine that I did it.
I got a chair, climbed on top of it, and got the file out of the closet, taking it down to the kitchen, and staring at the number until it became gibberish to my eyes.
Then, like the universe was trying to rub salt in my wounds, the TV that had been playing reruns of cheesy early '00s movies started playing a very familiar opening scene of a movie.
The Fast and the Furious.
That was it.
All my self-control could take.
I reached for the phone I had gotten on my own since Gunner had never gotten around to leaving me one like he said he would, plugged in the number, and called.
I called him.
The morning brought on a jackhammering in my temples and behind my eyes, the morning light and the movement of lifting myself off the couch made my stomach roll, threatening to revolt until I took a few long, deep breaths to calm it.
"Ugh," I groaned, raising a hand to my head, rocking back and forth for a long moment before I could even think straight enough to head for my purse where my unused pain meds from my stomach wound were situated. I popped two with a giant mug of coffee, then locked myself in the dark bathroom until they finally kicked in, allowing my stomach and head to calm enough so I could flick on the light, and look at myself in the mirror.
It wasn't pretty.
I was pale and splotchy.
My hair was a bird's nest.
And my eyes were red and swollen.
Red, yes, that made sense.
But swollen?
As my finger rose to touch the puffy eyelids, it suddenly came back to me in a rush.
The puffiness had nothing at all
to do with the alcohol.
Oh, no.
That was the crying.
There had been a lot of crying.
Which was likely half to blame for the headache as well.
I don't remember the last time I really had a cry. The kind that emptied out your soul, that made you genuinely worry about your sanity because you couldn't quite seem to calm it down, to gain control over yourself again.
That was exactly what had happened last night. I had cried until I fell asleep.
But not before I did something else first.
Something incredibly, ridiculously stupid.
"Oh, god," I groaned, bringing my hands up over my eyes, feeling my face heat up. "Oh, god. Oh, god. Oh, god."
I'd called Gunner.
I'd called Gunner... and left a message.
I took a deep breath, trying to stop the swirling embarrassment enough to focus, trying to remember through my wine-soaked brain what I had said.
It came back like a lightning rod when I looked back up at my reflection.
"I can't do it," I had started, my voice already starting to hitch. "I had to quit my job. My boss was a jerk and everything hurt. And the pay was degrading. I... I don't know what to do with myself here. I cook. I clean. I try to draw. But everything feels so empty. I feel empty here," I had added, my voice cracking finally, the tears starting. "I would say I wish this never happened, that Cortez never came into my life. But if he never had, I never would have met you. But maybe I do wish for that, you know? Because if this never happened. If he never happened, if you never happened, I never would have realized how hollow my life was. But now, it is all I can think about. It's all I can think about.
And I am so alone. I have no one to talk to. There is no one I can talk to. Because I can't be me anymore. I can't feel the way I feel anymore. Because I don't exist anymore. I don't exist, but there's nothing I can do about all these feelings inside that do exist still. There's nothing I can..." I'd broken off then, choking back a sob, sniffling hard. "I just... why did you leave like that?" I had asked before I suddenly realized what I was doing, hitting the end call button, then falling into the pillow on my couch, sobbing it all out.
And I must repeat... Oh, god.
I wasn't that woman.
I wasn't someone who called and cried at men. It was humiliating to realize I had done it, that I couldn't undo it, that there was no way to take it back, that he would pick up his phone - possibly already had - and heard me sobbing and sniffling and babbling, bemoaning my fate.
The Ghost Page 17
