3. alessia

PRESENT DAY

3

ALESSIA

I sip my iced coffee while I flip through my romance novel. I'm sitting at a table in front of the window at Chrome Beans. A small indie coffee shop that calls my name every time I need alone time or a break from the chaos in my head.

It's eight at night, and while I read, the smell of fresh coffee and baked pastries helps calm my nerves after another busy day at work. It's not too busy at Chrome Beans, but it's not slow by any means. I spot a few college students typing away research papers or studying hard on their laptops and groups of friends here and there chatting away.

Twenty minutes into reading, my phone pings, and my heart skips a beat. A part of me hopes it's Jack telling me he's going to cook dinner tonight or asking me why I'm not home yet. He's been acting a little more aggressive than usual, and I'm hoping this will be some type of start to change the tone of our relationship.

The distance feels like a breath of fresh air in a way.

Unknown: Why the sad face?

Confusion sets in as I narrow my brows at my brightened phone screen. It sits on top of the table before me, and I re-read the text for a few seconds. Gripping my book tight in my hand, I study it.

What an odd thing to say from an unknown number. I grab my phone slowly, dragging it among the wood, and look around to see if it's Jack playing a weird joke on me.

But nothing is out of the ordinary in the calm scenery surrounding me. I even look outside the clear windows of Chrome Beans but see nothing but cars driving by in the darkness and people in their own bubbles as they walk the sidewalk.

This text…something about it sends a chill up my spine.

Is someone…watching me?

I shake myself out of that eerie thought.

Sometimes, I'll get texts that say hi or something random, but this feels too real. Too personal. It's too thought out because usually when I get random texts or calls, there's a number attached to it. But this is different. I hold my screen, still staring at the text with an unrecognizable number. It just says unknown.

Me: Who is this? I think you have the wrong number.

I quickly tap my response and hit send, and I'm not sure if that was the best idea, but something inside me was urging me to reply. Usually, I ignore messages because they're just wrong numbers looking for the wrong person.

"Alessia!"

A familiar voice calls out for me, a voice that belongs to a Navy SEAL.

I look up to find Zeke Akana entering Chrome Beans, still in his uniform like he just got off work. He has a wide smile pulling at his lips. His dark hair is cut short, and he's clean-shaven. His dark brown eyes light up when he spots me sitting two tables away from the door. I return the smile with an awkward, shy one.

Zeke and I have been friends for years.He's been flirting with me for two of them, and recently, his persistence has a new edge to it. It might be because he hasn't seen Violet since she returned to Texas.

We became friends when Ravenmore hosted a BBQ for my high-school graduation party, and that's where I met SEAL Team Executioners Paul Alvarez and his team. Paul Alvarez died almost two years ago, but his imprint is still felt throughout the community.

My heart sinks as another dreadful familiar face follows behind Zeke.

Frankie.

Frankie is an ex-sailor who had multiple violations in his short career and was thrown out of the Navy.

We went to high school together, and somehow, he's weaseled his way into finding a friendship with Zeke.

There's a reason why I cringe whenever he's in the same vicinity as me. He's harassed me multiple times whenever we catch ourselves at El Devine at the same time.

They both stalk towards me, and my heart thumps against my rib cage. Frankie has a creepy grin on display. He's balding, with a few strands of hair left, and he is wearing a baggy jacket and jeans.

I close my book, ready to leave, wanting to get as far away from Frankie as possible. I'm sure he won't try anything publicly, especially in front of Zeke. Still, I wouldn't put it past him to try.

"Zeke. What's up?" I scoot out of my chair, grabbing my things slowly. "I was just leaving."

I startle him unintentionally. He pauses, stopping merely a meter away from me, with his hands ready to help me in any way I need.

"Leaving already?"

"Yeah…" I quip faster than my tongue can keep up. "I gotta get home. I was just stopping by for a quick coffee."

They both continue to watch me, and I take a step forward, but Zeke gets in front of me, blocking me from the doors.

"You look sad. Why the sad face? Trouble in paradise again?" His question throws me off. A whip of deja vu hits me, and a frown replaces my shy smile. Whoever this unknown person is asked me the same thing.

What a coincidence.

He knows about Jack, and he's always held a slight jealous cloud over my relationship. I've opened up to him about past arguments drunkenly at El Devine—something I regret doing.

"Oh, uh," I shrug, "I've got a lot on my mind. I'm getting deployed, but I'm sure you know that. We'll be working together the last time I checked."

"Right… We leave in just a few days. I'm looking forward to it. It's your first deployment, right?" Zeke finally moves, and I can feel Frankie's eyes burning holes in my back. Zeke holds open the door for me at Chrome Beans.

It is my first deployment. I went through multiple schools to get to this point in my career. Jumping through several challenging hoops, and I'm excited to do my job. At the same time, I'm well aware of the dangers and risks. The brutality of war has my nerves in knots, but I'm confident about what I signed myself up for.

"Yup," one foot is outside, ready to dart out to my car, but I turn to give Zeke a proper goodbye. He doesn't deserve the cold shoulder I'm giving his friend.

"Are you going to El Devine before we head out? You know one last party?" He asks as he puts his hands in his pockets. I shrug.

Gabe asked me the same thing earlier. Gabe is the owner of El Devine and used to be a Navy SEAL but medically retired two years ago. After he retired, he opened up his own business, and that's when El Devine was born. It sits about five minutes from the Navy base, and sailors and marines are about 90% of its customers.

"Maybe." I chirp, trying to hide how uncomfortable I'm feeling. Frankie's dark eyes turn into slits, and I'm internally cringing. "I gotta go, I'll see you later, Akana." I pretend Frankie is nonexistent and leave. Zeke waves me off and makes his way to the nearest barista.

My phone buzzes again, and I dare to check it as I get to my car.

Unknown: Just a ghost on the wall.

What the hell?

When I get to my car, I look up from my phone. There's a bouquet of marvelous flowers tucked into the windshield wipers. They're all black daisies like they've been painted that way, except one bright yellow in the center, untouched and glowing against the others.

"Let's fuck." He whispers into my ear, cold liquor breath lingers into my nose, and I groan in response. I already know who it is. My eyes are still closed, and I'm annoyed he's waking me up before I have to meet with Ravenmore.

"Jack...no. Please. I have to be up in—" I glance at the clock on my nightstand, opening one eye and staring at bright white digits.

2:12 am

"I have to be up in a few hours to see Ravenmore. Please stop."

But my college sweetheart boyfriend of three years doesn't, as always. He keeps pushing my boundaries and not in the ways I desire. I'm on my stomach when I feel his hands snake into my bottoms, pulling both my underwear and shorts off all the way down to my ankles. He yanks them off aggressively from my toes, and the clothes fall to the floor. I inhale sharply, my mind still blinded by sleepy fog. His intense demands forced my senses to come alive. His moves are rooted in the fierce salacity he exhilarates.

He's never done this before, and usually, this is something I've been wanting to explore…but not tonight.

I feel his chest on my back, his hardened length on my ass, trailing it down to my entrance. He stops when he finds my pussy, and I hold onto my bedsheets, preparing for the painful intrusion. I scrunch my white blankets into my palms until my knuckles match the color of my silk bedsheets, and then I shut my eyes tight.

"Babe...Alessia. I have to give you a proper goodbye." He bites my earlobe, and I grind my teeth, irritated...but most of all hurt.

He knows I'm getting deployed.

"Don't, Jack. Let's just sleep. We already said ‘goodbye' this afternoon," I beg. Even though I didn't want to. I don't have a sex drive these days, but either way, I gave in to him, bending me over the living room couch after dinner. The stress of work and the upcoming deployment has me wound tight, and I can't think of anything else lately but work. Either way, despite my dry mindset with sex, I gave in to him, letting him fuck me before he left for his friend's place earlier. He's just now returning home, drunk. As usual on Friday nights.

"Please, stop," I continue to plead with his drunken capacity, but my words fly over his head and into the thick night.

He doesn't stop. He ignores me, kissing my shoulder three times before his lips disappear.

"Let me say goodbye again." He growls, unable to take my rejection with patience.

I really don't want to fight with him, so I look at him over my shoulder and nod.

He grabs my waist, digging his hands onto my skin so tight, so drunkenly. I whimper from the unwanted pain. I love pain with my pleasure…just not right now, and lately, not from him. He pushes me up until I'm on my knees, bent over...still holding onto the bedsheets, and I close my eyes.

Then he pushes himself into me.

"Fuck, I'm going to miss this tight pussy," he moans.

I close my eyes tighter and let my mind drift into a different place while he abuses my body in the way he wants. Then, just like that, I'm in a different place of peace. The beach. The ocean is so blue in the summer. A warm breeze, not too hot. Not too cold. The sun shines bright, reflecting off the serene atmosphere. I smell fresh seafood and pi?a coladas by the water.

Yes...that's where I am right now.

I'm not being forced to have sex by my boyfriend so hard that the sound of his waist pounding against mine fills the air. My whimpers escape me with each pound of drunken lust he gives me. It all doesn't matter anymore. Just the sound of delusional waves and?—

My eyes bulge, and Jack stops fucking me when the glass breaks from our bedroom window, and I scream.

The sound of glass shattering ends in seconds, and so does my stunned yelp from my lungs.

"Ah fuck! Something got my shoulder!" Jack shouts, holding onto his wound.

He gets off me, and I scramble underneath the bed sheets for cover. Jack hides on the other side of the bed, grabbing his jeans to cover himself, and tears that had formed five minutes ago roll down even harder.

"What the fuck was that?" Jack looks at his hand, and a few drops of red appear on his fingertips.

I look at my broken window and then to the floor, trying to wrap my head around our situation. Jack investigates to see if anyone is standing outside our third-floor apartment building, but...nothing. There's no way someone could be on our patio without entering our home first. There are no stairs and no ladder to our deck.

"Did someone throw something at our window?" Jack stands up and throws on his jeans. He runs a hand through his red hair, and I search for my clothes, dressing myself once again.

"I don't know…" I wipe my tears away and search for any object thrown inside our home, looking through the broken glass, but nothing.

Not a brick? A rock?

Then I spot a hole in the wall. My eyebrows arch, and I walk fast towards it, eyeing the destruction I'm most likely going to have to pay for someone to fucking fix because Jack will do a botch job if I let him.

I get closer, and my eyes circle.

"It's a gunshot."

But why didn't we hear it ring loud? Why didn't we hear a loud pop, like if it was fireworks on the Fourth of July during the summer?

It was quiet...silenced.

Whoever is held responsible for this gunshot has a silencer on their weapon.

"We have to move. Let's get out of the bedroom now." The thoughts sink into me, ringing alarm bells that this was not an accident.

"Someone shot at us?!" Jack shrieks, looking at the hole in the wall. He hovers over me shirtless, his lean frame on display in the moonlight.

Now that he's in close proximity, I notice he's still bleeding, barely. It looks like a scratch, his flesh grazed.

I decide to investigate further, digging my small fingers into the hole, and that's when I feel the culprit.

I pull out a fired bullet, my fingers shaking, unable to hold still. I twist in my palm.

"Who would do this?" I ask Jack before I take off into my living room. I grab my cell phone that was hooked, charging into the wall, and dial 911.

Jack hadn't always been this way with me, but lately, he was struggling and had been going out more with his friends, and God knows what he's up to with them that he's been coming home with liquor stained on his body.

Did he piss someone off?

I wanted to question him, but I didn't feel the need to start an argument at two in the morning.

"Fuck if I know babe." He rubs my shoulders before running his hands across his own elbows for comfort.

I relay our situation to the 911 operator and put my cell phone onto my kitchen counter, sighing frustrated. I run my hands through my long black curls, and the need for a hair tie screams at me. I rub my temples, massaging the bizarre jitters from minutes ago.

I just wanted to sleep before I was in front of Ravenmore's desk, staring into cold, vibrant green eyes…my mother's newest endeavor.

I always fall asleep early so I can at least get a minimum of six hours before bed. It's the military in me. My body has grown accustomed to early morning hours and falling asleep as soon as the sun vanishes.

"Call your dad too…Admiral Ravenmore, right? He'll know what to do." He tells me before he sits on the living room couch and texts away at his phone. Even with his girlfriend being in the military, Jack is clueless when it comes to titles, ranks, and how it works.

"It doesn't work like that. He's not a police officer."

My mother has been with her new husband for years now, but I refuse to acknowledge him as a father figure. I already have a dad.

"What about your mother? You can talk to her, right? I'm going to get some sleep before I have to go job hunting in the morning." Jack shuts off his phone and goes to the kitchen. He opens the first-aid kit and cuts open a broad bandage.

Oh, good. He can wake me up from my peaceful slumber and make me go back to sleep now that I'm up with adrenaline and violation.

"Okay," I give in, not wanting to argue with him. "And Ravenmore is not my dad. Please don't call him that. He's just Henry to me, and I won't worry my mother with this." I reach for my coffee and start making a fresh pot. It looks like I won't be getting any sleep, so I might as well stay up.