ELLA

 

I woke up in the early afternoon feeling alone, which is weird because even though I prefer to be alone, I never actually feel alone. But when Luke didn’t come back last night after he took me back to my home, it made me feel alone. It made me feel disappointed, as if I had done something wrong, but most of all, I didn’t sleep because I didn’t feel safe without his presence.

I tossed and turned all night until I just resigned myself to the fact that I wasn’t going to be able to sleep, and then, as soon as the sun rose, I rang up Kara to talk to her, hoping that by the time I hung up that Luke will have returned.

I’m still waiting and I’m still talking to Kara while sitting on the couch, curled up underneath a thin, fleece blanket. My eyes are sore from staying awake so long, and I’m running on next to empty when it comes to my energy levels.

“I’m just glad you have someone watching over you,” Kara says and sighs. “I know I came off as overprotective the other day, but if I were in your shoes, I’d be scared shitless.” She laughs, and it’s contagious. I let out the first laugh I’ve had in twenty-four hours.

“To be honest,” I begin, “I was scared, but you know me.”

“Oh boy, do I.” She chuckles again. “It’s okay to not have everything in order at all times. It’s okay to be vulnerable. God knows I’ve been there. Just make sure you’re as open and honest as you can be with this guy, because he can’t protect you if you’re not.”

I exhale sharply, so loud that she can hear me through the phone.

“You weren’t honest, were you?” she questions with an exasperated sigh.

“Not in so many words…”

“Ella!” she scolds me in her best motherly voice. “You didn’t tell him about your past, did you?”

“He’s found out a little on his own, but I haven’t been upfront. Again, you know me. It’s not easy for me to talk about.” I push my tongue against the inside of my cheek. “After I fired him—”

“You fired him!?” she shrieks. “Girl—!”

“I’ll get to that part, but yeah, after he came to visit me, I received a warning through texts to not involve anyone else, so I fired him. And then, I decided to take matter into my own hands, so I went downtown to try and secure a gun from David Matheson…”

I’m just waiting for her to judge me.

“Have you lost your damn mind?” I can practically see the scowl written into her face. “He was worst mistake you ever made.”

“Yeah, I know and it’s not like he’s changed. He’s still the same old shady David he’s always been.” I push the fleece blanket off me and rise to my feet as I hear a car zipping by outside. I pull the curtains sideways and take a peak outside to see a delivery truck turning around the corner. “Anyways, that situation ended with Luke kicking David’s ass.”

“Well, that I can get behind. He’s had one of those coming for as long as I can remember, and trust me, I have an extensive memory.” She pauses, shifts the conversation. “But tell me more about this Luke.”

“Well, like I said, I fired him, but he’s back again. Or at least, he was back last night until I was attacked in my home, and then he left again and he hasn’t returned. I’m just worried that the more he learns about me, the less likely it will be that he’s going to stick around.”

“What are we talking about here, Ella? What do you mean, stick around? Like, you want him to stick around for the long haul?”

“No.” I shake my head, though she clearly can’t see me. It’s more about convincing myself otherwise. “I mean stick around long enough to see this out. At first, I thought it could be nothing, but after I was attacked, I realized that I can’t deny the truth anymore, and the truth is that there’s someone from my past after me. I just wish I could figure out whom.”

“You’ll need to talk to him about that,” she drops her voice. “But for right now, I just want to know all the sordid details about this Luke King. Is he as sexy as I’ve built him up to be in my imagination?”

I let out a heavy sigh and find myself drifting back down onto the couch and switch the phone from one ear to the other. “He’s tall, dark, and handsome,” I begin, dropping my head slightly to the side as I get lost in the memory of him. “He’s strong and cocky, a little bit of a smartass too, but he’s smart and perceptive.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah… Enough about the boring stuff. What about his body?”

I laugh again, for the second time in the span of only a few minutes. After last night, I thought I’d never laugh again, but I’m instantly reminded why Kara is the only person I still talk to from my past. “He’s got this body of a Greek god with strong arms and an even stronger chest. When he was sleeping right behind me—”

She lets out an audible gasp. “When…”

“It was nothing sexual. He literally just lay with me as I fell asleep. It was the only way I could force myself to sleep.”

“Girl, you’re playing with fire and I’m so damn excited.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not the one who’s going to get burned to the ground…”

“Don’t say that.”

“Well, what do you want me to—?”

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Each pound against the door is harder than the one before and my heart begins to race and then begins to pound. I jump to my feet and pull back the curtains once more to see Luke standing on my porch dressed in dark jeans and a white tee.

“I have to go, Kara…”

“What’s wrong?” she questions, panic in her voice. “Do I need to call nine-one-one?”

“It’s Luke. He’s here on my porch.”

“I want all the sordid scoop.”

“I’ll talk to you later.” I hang up the phone and drop it onto the coffee table before rushing to the door and ripping it open just as Luke begins to knock again.

“What took you so long to answer?” he questions before pushing his way inside, leaving me to close the door behind him.

“Why did you knock?” I answer his question with a question before crossing my arms over each other and staring at him defiantly. “I mean, you just waltz right on in like you own the place anyways.”

He twists to face me, wags a finger gently in my face. “Am I noticing the faint trace of an attitude problem?”

“You left last night and you didn’t come back.”

“Yeah.” He scratches his thumb against his nose. “I had some thinking to do.”

“Thinking about what? Because the last thing I knew, we were both back on the same page and then I was attacked and you leave without hardly saying a word, so tell me what am I supposed to think or feel?”

He shrugs and then cracks a careless but forced smile. “I’m not going to tell you how to live your life.” He steps towards me, his tall frame towering over me. And for the first time, I almost feel afraid of him, or maybe I’m just terrified that he’s learned all my secrets overnight. “But I told you that you had to be honest with me, and although you might not know it, withholding information is the same thing as being dishonest.” He wets his lips, drops his gaze to me and then shifts to take a seat on the couch, throwing one hand over the arm of the furniture. “So, I’m going to give you one last opportunity to be honest with me without me having to prompt you for the truth.”

I battle him with a stare, hoping he relents first, but he’s firm in his resolve. His eyes stay locked with mine and it’s a battle I stand no chance at winning.

“Fine,” I huff and chew into my lip. I’m aggravated. I’m scared, not just of who’s out there but of losing him, too. “You want to know all my darkest secrets?” I yell and nod my head, grit my teeth, and prepare to unload on him. “That man at the pawn shop?”

He cocks a curious brow.

“We used to date, back in high school.” I take careful notice of his face, and he doesn’t seem the least bit surprised. “It was one of my biggest mistakes, but I was going through my bad boy phase my senior year and he was notorious for consistently finding himself on the opposite side of the law. Late one night, after our curfew, I was driving him across town to pick up something from his older brother when were stopped by the police who searched my car and found drugs. He insisted that they weren’t his and so I took the fall for him and thusly the reputation I had worked so hard to build up in my school tumbled the very next day. I was the talk of the school, much to my dismay.” I drop my head slightly and chuckle. “It’s the reason I refuse to go back to my high school reunion. People don’t remember me as that girl who got good grades and never got into trouble. They remember me as the girl who got busted, and then even more tragically, they remember me as the girl who lost her parents only a few years after graduation.”

“Again, I’m sorry to hear about that…” He cocks his head to the left, trying to avoid eye contact with me, but after him scolding me, I’m not about to let him get off easy.

“Look at me,” I yell almost as loud as a scream, my voice trembling. He twists back to me and swallows nervously. “You wanted the truth, well here it is. Even after David pinned his drugs on me, I still thought I loved him and we stayed together until I caught him cheating on me, and so I got revenge the only way I thought I knew how. I began dating his older brother for a few short months until I realized that wasn’t going to work either, so right before the start of summer, David and I got back together. It was an even more tumultuous relationship than the one we had before. He became jealous over my every move and action, and finally, I had enough. I packed up everything and moved away from the valley to create a new life for myself, one where people didn’t know me.”

I take a seat on the couch beside him as I head into the more emotional stuff. I don’t often open up about the loss of my parents, but this is the second time in only a few days that I’ve talked about them with Luke, who’s basically a complete stranger to me still.

I think he senses my anxiety because he reaches across the short distance between us and drops a comforting hand onto my thigh. My eyes travel to meet his and in his face, I can see a sullen look. I nod at him before continuing.

“My parents and Kara were the last things I was holding onto, the last remnants of my old life. Once they passed, there was nothing else to tie me to who I used to be, so I thought if I changed my last name, I could really just leave it all behind, and so that’s what I did.”

“Hmmm.” He nods, taking everything I’ve said in. “Why Ella Gold? Why not somebody else?”

“You want the whole truth?”

“So help me God.” He raises his right hand as to swear an oath.

I roll my eyes and drop my head against the back of the couch. “Gold seemed like a lustrous, luxurious choice.”

“That’s a little ridiculous, right?” A grin hitches across his lips, and thank God, because it helps lighten the mood just a touch.

I swat the back of my hand against his chest. “Shut up.”

He adjusts himself on the couch and pivots to face me. “You know, you don’t have a bad past.” When I roll my eyes, he scoots even closer to me, so close that I can feel the heat of his body. “I’m being serious. You wouldn’t believe some of the shit I’ve heard. But yours? It’s not that bad. It’s not anything you need to run away from.”

I turn to look him straight in the eyes and then eek out lowly, “You don’t know me.”

“Right,” he shrugs, “but I think I know enough.” He drops his head and laughs softly. “I wish you would have been upfront with me though because I was really starting to think you had actual skeletons in your closet.” He leans in even closer to me and combs one finger through my hair. “We’re going to get to the bottom of this. We’re going to figure out who’s behind the letters and the messages, and we’re going to stop them before anyone can get hurt.”

My lips quiver as I begin to speak. “How can you know that?”

He cracks a wide, cocky grin. “Because I’m Luke King and you’re Ella Gold, and together, none of those losers stand a chance.”

“I like the way you think.” I nod and crush the back of my palms against my eyes to dry any tears that might be there, although I don’t feel any. It’s almost like I’m too exhausted to cry, and what’s the point anyways. “So you’re not mad at me?”

He jerks in place, a grimace across his lips. “Why would I be mad at you? You’ve just been more honest with me than I expected. The truth is that I already knew a lot of what you told me, but I needed to hear it from you.”

“That’s kind of annoying…” I grind out and tongue the inside of my cheek. “But you really don’t think it’s that bad?”

“I wouldn’t lie to you.” He pets a finger smooth against my cheek and smiles again. Then he leans in, and I think he’s going to kiss me, but I can’t…

I break away from his kiss before it can even come close to connecting.