12. Home

TWELVE

I'm two hours into my shift, antsy and on edge.

Frank's doing payroll in the back office. Brendon took off because he had a doctor's appointment as soon as arrived. Another specialist, and I'd feel a tiny bit guilty for it if I wasn't seconds away from grabbing a hammer and taking my frustrations out by banging on any part of the garage I can reach.

Simone never showed up.

She said she would. She offered to bring me breakfast, and I hauled my ass over to the garage as fast as I could so that I wouldn't miss it when she arrived.

I didn't want her to be alone with Brendon. That didn't end up being an issue since he was gone before I even parked my car, but he got back about fifteen minutes ago, bitching that his latest doctor can't figure out what's wrong with his gut.

I managed a few noncommittal noises, busying myself with tinkering with one of Frank's trucks. I'm pissed as it is that I had to come in today since we haven't had a single fucking customer today. If Frank would've gotten off his ass to cover the garage while Brendon was out, I could be with Simone right now instead of wondering where the hell she is.

To add insult to injury, Frank's a bit of a hard-ass. When he's on site, he refuses to let any of us our phones while on the clock. I've seen him threaten a couple of other guys with their jobs if he catches them, and I need this job too much to risk his temper.

When he's not around, it doesn't matter. But when he's here… fuck. All I want to do is see if she's called or texted me. If I pull up the tracking app, I can see if her car moved, or her purse. It would take two seconds, but I can spare them.

I slam my hand down on the side of the truck.

Brendon looks up from the paperwork he's doing. Once he figured out I wasn't quite paying attention to him, he found something to keep himself occupied. I want to ask Frank if it's okay if I head out since Brendon's back, but I know better. When the door to his office is closed, leave Frank alone. Until he does poke his head out, I have to stick around the garage with this guy.

He glances over at me. For a split second, he frowns. His expression makes me think that he's trying to remember something he might have forgotten.

"Hey, Jakey?"

I'm usually so much better at controlling my emotions. Usually. But it's been three hours since Simone told me she would be stopping by to bring me a breakfast, and maybe have a quick chat.

I know her. I know what she didn't say.

Something's up. Something's wrong?—

"What?"

Brendon's dark eyes flash in annoyance. Grabbing something from the desk in the reception area, he flings something across the garage at me. "Just wanted to let you know you left this here yesterday. Must've fallen out of your coveralls or something ‘cause it's not like anyone's skiing in fucking June."

A chill rushes through me even as my reflexes kick in, snatching the black something out of the air.

My mask.

What the fuck is Brendon doing with my mask?

I have three. I usually don't bother washing them, but after I wore it in the shower with Simone, I tossed this one in with the laundry.

Is he right? Could it have gotten caught in my coveralls and I didn't notice?

"Thanks," I tell him, trying to hold back the annoyance I can't help but feel. "I didn't even realize I'd lost it."

"You almost did. Remember that blonde chick with the pink convertible who ghosted me? She stopped in earlier. She's the one who found it, too. Had to ask for it back before she took off without even telling me what was wrong with her car."

Simone didn't ghost him. My sweet vixen never had any interest in Brendon at all. He can be bitter as fuck all he wants, and I'd love to rub it in how there's nothing wrong with her car. The only reason why she was here was because she was coming to see me.

Wait—

She was here. Brendon saw her.

And Simone saw my mask.

No. No. She didn't. She couldn't.

Could she?

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I don't care. Let Frank fire me. I only got this job because I needed to get close to Simone. But if Simone put two and two together and figured out that the Watcher's unique balaclava is mine… I have to make sure she's okay.

I have to explain.

Shoving my mask into the front pocket of coveralls, I bolt toward the employee parking lot.

Behind me, Brendon's voice calls out, "Jakey? Where are you going?"

I don't answer him because I don't fucking know, do I? The second my ass hits the seat of my car, I yank my phone out of my coverall pocket. I try my best to ignore the pang that shoots through me when I see there isn't a single damn notification from Simone.

It's okay. I have the tracker app.

My finger is sweaty as I try to open it up on my phone. I have to wipe my shaky hands against my coveralls a few rough times before I can get the touchscreen to work. When I finally do, I slap my steering wheel so hard that I never break my fucking wrist.

Because the tracker is offline.

Because Simone must have searched her car and found it.

Because she must have pried it off and crushed it with her wheels.

Because Simone is gone.

It paysto give way to your obsessive side.

When I was twelve, my parents already knew there was something wrong with me. My dad tried to insist that I was fine, but my mom is the one who brought me to be tested. Before I ever made it to high school, I knew that being so obsessive has something do with my diagnosis: borderline personality disorder. I wasn't born with the ability to regulate my emotions, and I've spent the last fifteen years trying to figure out how to do it myself.

It doesn't always work. I fuck up, and that's how I lost both Casey and Heather. With Simone, I saw my third chance at forever. I've tried everything I could to make this one right, and that included being more logical than emotional.

Emotions told me that she'd never run from me once she saw how much I loved her. Logic said that I've already seen two girls be unable to accept the weight of my love. If Simone tried to leave me, I'd chase her, but I would never give her the chance to slip out of my reach the way that Casey did.

So I put a tracker on her car. It wasn't hidden too well because I didn't care if Simone found that one.

Not when I hit another in her trunk, and one in her purse. And that wasn't all.

If I could get my hands on a microchip tracker like I've heard the Sinners' tech guy makes, I would've shot it into Simone's arm while she was sleeping. Since I couldn't, I have to rely on the back-up trackers, plus the silent app I put on her phone.

She thought she could escape me. Once I got over my initial horror that she would try, I'm more than happy to prove her wrong.

The tracker leads me to a small four-story hotel about forty minutes away from Merrill Grove. My heart skips a beat when I see the pink Mazda parked in the lot. She has to be here. If it was anyone else, I might have thought they'd dump their car to throw me off the track, but this is Simone.

Her car is here and that means that so is she.

I pull off my coveralls, tossing them and my mask into the back seat of my car before I get out. I'm wearing jeans and a plain grey tee. Plain, boring clothes that you see on any guy around my age with the benefit that it doesn't have my first name embroidered on it.

I take a second to calm myself, schooling my features into a pleasant young husband who, whoops, was supposed to meet his wife here, but she has all the room keys now and she's not answering her phone. And, yes, I know it's not usual protocol to print me my own when she's the one who came in and rented the room, but you'll be doing me a big, big favor if you do…

Poor kid. The desk clerk is a fresh-faced brunette on the wrong side of twenty. Under my smile and my charm, she didn't stand a chance. With a hurried apology for even making me explain that much, she scurries off before coming back with a key card for Room 203.

Simone Burke's room.

You'd think she would've made up a fake name if she wanted to really hide out on me. There's no doubt in my mind that she is, and as broken as I am, one thing I'm not is delusional. She found out the truth about my identity too soon and she bolted, just like all the others.

But she's different. She's the one.

And I won't let her get away.

Even without the room number, I would've used the tracker I have in her purse to find her in this chintzy hotel. Thanks to Amelia at the desk, I don't have to, and I take one last deep breath before

She gasps."Jake. What are you… how did you…"

Simone didn't scream. No matter what happens next, the one thing I'll remember is that she didn't scream when she saw me. She gasped, and she stood up suddenly from the bed where she was sitting, waiting, but she didn't scream.

I close the door behind me.

She saw the mask. The way she's looking at me now… I didn't honestly think that she'd just decided to take a day trip out to the next city over for no reason. She knows. She knows I'm the Watcher.

And since she does, there's absolutely no reason for me to hide who I really am.

I point at her. "You left me."

My voice is shaking. It's nowhere near as deep as it is when I'm being the Watcher, but it's raw. In pain.

She left me.

Simone wasn't supposed to leave me…

She licks her bottom lip. "I went to the garage," is all the explanation she gives me.

"I know. Brendon told me. You found a mask?—"

"Your mask."

I don't deny it. How can I? "Yes."

It's my turn to wait. To see if she's going to come out and ask me if I'm the man who burst into her room last night the same way I did just now.

Why would she? The answer to that question is right there. Mask or no mask, I can't hide who I am—and now there's no reason to.

But Simone… she's biting down on her bottom lip.

And I remember. That sensation that something was wrong, the nerves that have been fucking with me since she called and said we needed to talk. On my drive away, I thought, if there's one good thing that comes out of this, it'll be that she knows. She finally knows. I can be the Watcher and Jake, and whatever she wanted to stay, she can let it go.

I don't think she's going to let it go.

"Why were you at the garage?"

I have a suspicion. It's twisted me up in knots all day, reminding me of that night when I realized that I was jealous of myself. I need her to choose both sides of me: the nice guy and the masked stranger who backed her into her bed before being invited into it.

But if she wanted one and not the other…

"Tell me, Simone. I need to know."

"Jake, I?—"

I stalk toward her. She moves so that she's standing by the wall, one hand supporting her there while I rock back on my heels, desperate to touch her while also knowing that, right now, she needs me to keep some distance.

My heart stutters in my chest. "Simone… Look at me. You've got me teetering on the edge. My sweet vixen… only you can do this to me. One word from you and I'd fucking jump. Is that what you want from me? You want me to jump?"

The fingers on her free hands rise up to her chin, covering her lips. She mumbles something.

"I didn't hear you."

"I said, I went there to end things with you."

I go absolutely still.

"With me," I say, gesturing at myself. "Or me?"

I cover the bottom half of my face with my hand, a mockery of the balaclava I wore around her.

"With Jake," she confesses, and my heart fucking breaks.

I let out a howl of pain. "So you do want me to jump?"

She rushes toward me. "No. No! It's not like that. I thought… I thought I was saving you. Right? That if the Watcher killed Will, and he found out about you… what if he hurt you? I had to let you go before I got too attached. That makes sense."

Her hands are on my arms, clutching me so tightly, her fingernails are digging into my skin.

"Listen to me. Okay, Jake? Listen to me. I can explain?—"

Fine. "Then why did you go? When you saw the mask… when you knew… why did you run?"

She says she can explain, but she can't answer that with anything other than, "I don't know. I… I don't know!"

Her eyes are wild. No longer the sad, haunted eyes I love, something about the pure insanity in their depths now has me responding in kind.

Who's crazier: you or me…

Simone is here. She tried to leave, and whatever her reason, I found her. Always a planner, I had a backup in mind in case Simone reacted like this eventually, and I'm more than prepared to go ahead with it.

But first…

She's clutching my arms. I drop my hands to her hips, tugging her up against me.

The one downside to wearing a mask whenever I was with Simone is how I still haven't had the chance to kiss her. Not her mouth or her pussy, and I've spent months wondering what she would taste like.

The mask is off. Both of them are. With my fingers a possessive brand on her hips, I squeeze her with just enough pressure to get her to gasp. If I was Jake, I'd take my time, nibbling her lips, trying to coax her into opening up to me.

If I was the Watcher, I would've demanded her to open, then fisted her hair before kissing her.

Right now? I'm both, and the man that I've always been sees an opportunity and takes it. Her mouth is open so I slant mine over hers, just about fucking it with my tongue the same way I gave her my cock last night.

And because this is Simone… my Simone… she immediately responds to the kiss.

Suddenly, I have her hoisted up, legs wrapped around me, her back against the wall, fingers digging into her thighs.

And I'm kissing her as though both of our lives depend on it.

She's the first of us to draw away, and I follow her. Doesn't she know? Hasn't she figured that out yet? No matter where she goes, I'll be there, and it's the same right now. I give her a few seconds to breathe before I'm kissing her again, clutching her to me, trying to devour her anyway that I can.

The kiss starts out forceful before quickly turning gentle. I get the chance to nibble, to taste, and I'm in fucking heaven—until Simone gets her breath back enough to speak again.

"You took off your mask, Jake" she whispers against my lips. "How do I get you to stop now?"

I want to tell her I won't. That I can't.

But as much as I'm obsessed with this woman, I love her even more...

"You tell me to ‘stop'."

"And you'll leave me alone?" Her forehead tilts until that's bumping against mine, too. "I couldn't get Will to leave me alone until I knew you killed him."

"For you, baby. I did it for you."

She sighs out a breath. "I know."

"You wanted me to."

She swallows roughly. "I did…"

"And now you're going to tell me that I'm the only one you've ever wanted while I fuck you and remind you that I'm yours, too."

Simone's eyes snap open. "Jake?—"

"Should I stop?"

She opens her mouth. Closes it.

Shakes her head.

Thank fucking God.

Using the wall to hold her weight, I free one hand so that I can start tugging off her jeans. She braces herself with my shoulder, using her other hand to help me. We do the same with her panties, getting them down just enough that I have access to her pussy.

I lick my thumb, swirling it around her clit before dipping it into her pussy. She's so fucking hot, so fucking wet… I put my thumb in my mouth, laving off the moisture gathered there… so fucking sweet that I'm praying to ever God there is and that's every existed for her to say anything other than the word ‘stop' right now.

To distract her, I bury my face in her neck, suckling it, kissing it, driving her mad to the point she's writhing with her back against the wall as I struggle with getting my own jeans down one-handed.

Almost there. Shit. The zipper's stuck. Come on… come on… yes.

The second I get my cock freed, I shift her just enough so that I can line our bodies up. One push. All I need is one push once I'm perfectly positioned and I'm right where I belong again.

I'm fucking home.