We head toward my apartment—Tye’s apartment—on the Upper East Side. I don’t know why I’m already mentally referring to it as his, since we’ve lived together in it for the last three months, but … it’s never really felt like mine. Not even before he lost his job and started spending his nights drinking and getting high.

How much longer do I put up with that?

I don’t know. I was never one who’d been blessed with boatloads of patience, but breaking up also seemed like a lot of work. Did I really care that much? Apathy stole over me at the thought.

I call into work and get my boss on the phone. “Listen, I thought they were going to let me go,” I say casually, “but it turns out, they need me a little longer. As their hostage.”

I wait for his screeching and panic to subside—he doesn’t really care about me, he just doesn’t want to have to do my work for me—and then when he finally winds down, I say, “I’ll call you later,” then end the call. Actually…I think about it a bit. They may be able to track my movements with my cell phone, and my boss just might call this into the police. My latest work is so boring, my boss would involve the police rather than be forced to actually do it himself.

I shut my phone down completely and slide it into my purse. Now, no tracking available.

I feel a little happier already.

We head up the elevator and down the hallway to my apartment, with me doing my best not to breathe too deeply around Harlan. Or at least obviously. He smells so damn good. It’s hard to keep my hands to myself, but I just barely manage. He said he’d kidnap me for the day, not fuck me. There is a difference, sadly enough.

I slid my key into the lock and opened up the front door. “Tye, I’m home. I have someone with…”

My voice dies off as I see Tye in bed…fucking another woman.

Not just any woman, but a high-end stripper, Candi, who lives downstairs from us. I’d caught Tye staring at her rack more than once, but he’d always claimed he was just a red-blooded male, checking other women out, but he’d never actually fuck them.

I guess that was a lie.

At the sound of my voice, Tye flips over and scoots up the bed, pulling the sheets up to his chest. “Hey, Becca,” he says with a weak smile. “I didn’t know you were going to come home so early. Shouldn’t you be at work?”

“Shouldn’t you not be fucking the stripper?” I turn to her and she’s just staring at me, frozen with shock. “Get some clothes on and get out of here. At least for now, I live here and I don’t exactly want you all up in my face. Got it?”

She nods and scurries off the bed and into her clothes, before crab walking past us to get out the front door. I see, out of the corner of my eye, that Harlan keeps his eyes on a blank wall, away from Candi’s luscious body, the whole time. He has every reason to sneak a peek, and he doesn’t take it.

Surprise wells up in me at the thought. How is it that my kidnapper shows more respect towards me than my…well, now ex-boyfriend?

I realize that as surprised as I am, I’m not angry. I didn’t care enough to be angry.

And didn’t that just sum it all up?

“Why is there a guy here?” Tye blusters. He reaches down to the ground, straining for his boxers, and Harlan slams his boot down on top of them. Tye jerks his hand away and looks back at me, whining. “Who is this guy? Have you been cheating on me?”

“Tye, you low-lying piece of shit man, I have never even thought about cheating on you, you little dirt worm. For your information, you cock sucking pile of horse shit, this guy has kidnapped me, you low-life bastard, and I’m quite happy about it!” My chest is heaving, I’m glaring daggers at him, and he shrinks back against the pillows.

“Shouldn’t we call the police then or something?”

How is it that I’ve never noticed how high-pitched his voice is? After listening to the low timbre of Harlan’s voice, vibrating through me with every word, Tye sounds like a girl …before puberty.

“Actually, what we’re going to do is, you’re going to stay in that bed, right there, and not move an inch. I’d hate to see any square inch of your flesh without being forced to. And what I’m going to do is pack up my shit, turn all of my payments off, and leave you to actually pay for your own lifestyle. I sure hope you have enough money to pay Candi ‘cause last I heard, she doesn’t come cheap.”

Harlan looks up at me, and I realize he’s twirling a knife around in his hand. “You sure you don’t want me to teach him a lesson?” he asks casually, the blade flashing in the light with every rotation. Tye’s eyes are trained on the blade and a little squeaking noise comes out. Like a human-sized chew toy.

“No,” I say with a sigh. “The paperwork would be too much. You just watch over his skinny ass while I throw my shit into some bags.”

Harlan shrugs nonchalantly and I begin gathering up my things. I’m surprised by how little I have to move out. I’d kept most of my stuff in a storage unit, telling myself that “someday,” I’d move it into our new apartment.

Maybe a part of me knew all of this was going to come tumbling down.

Shoving the last of my toiletries into an overnight bag, I look around the apartment. No pictures to take down from the walls, no dishes in the kitchen. I’d put so little into the apartment, I probably would’ve made myself more at home in a hotel.

And yet, I spent the last three months paying every bill that came through the door for this place.

I shove that thought away. Tye is on his own now. Let him find another sugar momma. Maybe he can hook up with Candi and they can fuck their way into a passel of babies.

“Ready?” Harlan asks.

“Sure am,” I say with a huge smile. I am surprised by how light I feel. How happy. What a difference from this morning. It's like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

“Good.” He turns back to Tye, slips his knife back into his boot, draws back his fist and decks him.

A squeal of surprise and laughter spills out of me. A squeal of surprise and pain spills out of Tye.

“Why’d you do that, man?” he whines, rocking back and forth, covering his eye, and what was sure to be a nice shiner by tomorrow. “I wasn’t fighting you or nothing.”

Harlan ignores his whining, grabs his arm and hauls him out of bed, opening the sliding glass door out onto the fire escape and shoving him outside.

Buck ass fucking naked.

“What are you doing?” His howling is getting louder by the moment, but Harlan simply closes the door, cutting off the sound, and flicks the lock into place.

“Ready,” he says to me casually, and I can hardly walk to the front door of the apartment, I’m laughing so hard.

Oh yeah, what a difference from this morning.