Chapter Seventeen
Jenna
I dreamed of Leon. Not the Leon I had come to known over the past year, the Leon who turned red with rage and raised his fists to make a point. No, this was the Leon I had fallen in love with when I’d met him the year before, the sweet and charming Leon who had even won my parents over until the bruises started to appear, until he took control of my social media accounts and phone.
I woke in a cold sweat sometime in the middle of the night. Moonlight and shadows danced across the walls. Something wasn’t right. I could feel it in the balmy air. I sat up to push away the blankets that were tangled around my legs. Derek’s bedroom window was open. I could see the flutter of his curtains in the late-night breeze. All the lights were off.
Disappointment swelled in me. Of course the lights are off. He works at night. Still, I couldn’t shake off the unease growing inside me. Wiping away the sweat that gathered on my forehead, I walked barefoot across the freshly polished floorboards and into the dark hallway. Parched from the heat, I made my way down the groaning staircase to the kitchen. The hum of the fridge greeted me. My hand trailed across the cool kitchen counter as I reached for a glass in the cupboard next to the sink.
“Jenna.”
I whirled around at the sound of Leon’s voice cutting through the darkness. Moonlight danced over the sharp features of his clean-shaven face. A grin tugged at his lips as he moved gracefully through the dark shadows of the kitchen.
Fear rooted me to the kitchen floor. My heart lodged itself in my throat, thudding there frantically. I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t do anything. No matter how much I told my legs to run, to get away, they remained motionless.
He approached me as silently as a shadow. He was dressed in his usual attire of a nice button-up shirt that he needed to be dry cleaned and ironed. His blond-colored locks were styled perfectly. Everything about him demanded authority, and I was utterly powerless against it.
“Did you honestly think you could hide from me?” he asked a bit coyly. The thought seemed to amuse him given the chuckle in his chest, but I knew better. It was a warning of things to come.
I tried to swallow the bulge in my throat. Scream, Jenna. Do something. I opened my mouth, but long fingers pinched my lips shut painfully. Leon towered above me with a dark scowl now crossing his face.
“Don’t scream,” he warned, tracing my lips with a fingertip. I couldn’t stop trembling. “Who’s going to hear you? The guy next door isn’t even here. No one is going to hear you scream.”
Tears filled my eyes. “Leon, please,” I mumbled. I tried to pry his fingers away from my lips. “You’re hurting me. Stop.”
His fingers only pinched harder. Something flashed in his eyes.
“You aren’t going to hurt like you hurt me,” he said calmly before pressing his lips hard against mine in a bruising kiss.
My stomach churned violently. I thrashed desperately in the circle of his arms to get away, but nothing I did phased him. He only grew stronger each time I struggled to get away, and eventually he had me pinned me down to the floor. I screamed when Leon leaned forward to press his lips against the side of my neck.
“You’re mine, and only mine!” he growled into my ear, his hips digging into my pelvis painfully. “No one will ever have you like I will. Trust me on that.”
“Jenna!”
Strong hands gripped my shoulders. The dream folded away instantly, along with the pressure of Leon’s body pressed against mine. I was tangled up in a blanket with warm sunshine playing on my skin.
“Jenna.”
Relief surged through me at the sound of Derek’s concerned voice. I opened my eyes to find him kneeling beside me on the bed, a concerned frown spread across his face. It was just a dream. Just a horrible dream. I let out a trembling breath while Derek helped me sit up.
“What happened?” I asked shakily.
“I don’t know,” Derek said, helping me tug the sheets away from my legs. “I went downstairs while you were sleeping to start coffee. That’s when I heard you screaming.”
I took in the white walls of Derek’s bedroom while I willed my heart to slow down. A cold sweat dripped down the sides of my cheeks.
“I-I had a bad dream,” I said, wiping the sweat away with the back of my hand. “That’s the first one I’ve had in a long time.”
“It sounded like you were being attacked.”
Derek rose from the bed, his hand resting at his right hip. That was when I caught sight of the hilt of the gun he had drawn on me the day I’d fallen off the roof. My stomach knotted uneasily as he placed it back on the bed stand.
“I called a few coworkers this morning,” Derek said. “They found him staying at a hotel on the other side of the city.”
My throat tightened. “So he knows about the restraining order now?”
“Yes. If he comes anywhere near here again, he’ll find his place in jail. I can guarantee that.”
I played with the sheets anxiously. Even if Leon obeyed this restraining order, that still meant I had to find somewhere else to go. I couldn’t stay in the house knowing Leon had been trying to find a way in. If Derek wouldn’t have caught him… A shiver went up my spine just thinking about it.
“What is it?” Derek asked. The mattress shifted as he crawled back onto the bed to sit next to me. “You appear to be in deep thought over there.”
“I have to move,” I said. “I can’t stay in this neighborhood now.”
Derek stiffened. I turned to look at him, but his gaze was fixated on the bedroom window that faced mine.
“You can’t keep running away from him,” he said eventually. “You have to deal with this in a way that will make it clear you aren’t backing down, or else he’ll just keep coming after you.”
Those words chilled me to the core, because I knew they were true. Leon didn’t give up easily on anything. Once he got an idea in his head, that was it. Nothing could persuade his mind.
“That’s my point,” I said. “He’ll keep coming after me because he thinks I’m his. That’s how Leon works.”
“That’s how all abusers work,” Derek said sharply. “I’ve dealt with guys like Leon for a long time, and believe it or not, there are people who are worse than Leon.” He trailed a hand through his hair with an agitated sigh. “There comes a day in their lives where they find something else to be fixated on. You just have to keep away from him until then, unfortunately. There really is only so much the courts can do besides tell him to stay away for certain amounts of time.”
“It’s just a piece of paper,” I said, thinking of the restraining order folded neatly in my wallet downstairs. It was just an inanimate object telling a person what to do. “He probably threw it in the trash the second those cops walked out of his hotel room. He did it with the other one.”
The only reason Leon didn’t get a chance to see me after what had happened that night at the bar was because I had packed a bag in a hurry before his parents had bailed him out. I’d been on a plane before he could even figure out what had happened. I reached up to comb my fingers through my hair anxiously. How did he even find me? I had done everything the shelter and police had told me to do back in California. No one knew where I was besides my mother.
“I don’t even know how he found me,” I said. “He figured it out somehow.”
“Hey.” I glanced over my shoulder when Derek touched my bare shoulder with his hand. My eyes slipped closed briefly at the gentle touch. “Everything will be fine. I promise.”
I shook my head at him. “You don’t want this drama, Derek. You have enough of it with your ex-wife already, and we aren’t even together.”
“Let me be the judge of what I can handle,” he said, cupping my chin firmly in the palm of his hand. “For now, just trust me while I figure some things out. Okay?”
“Okay.”
He leaned in to kiss me. Just the briefest touch of Derek’s lips against mine melted away the fear that coated every inch of me. I reached up to trace my fingers across the bristles of his cheeks while our tongues danced lazily. A hazy warmth filled me as Derek’s arms surrounded me in a strong embrace a second later to lay me back against the pillows.
Nothing could ever taint the feeling of Derek’s body hovering over mine, his soft skin and strong muscles pressed to mine.
“I want something different this time. You okay with that?” He licked at my mouth, his eyes filled with dark desire.
I couldn’t refuse him anything. “Of course. Just don’t hurt me.”
He chuckled and moved to his knees, pulling is shirt over his head before he got back up. “Take off your clothes, Jenna. Get on your hands and knees for me. I want to feel you come from behind.” He pulled down his pants and gave me a smile that left me fully assured that things were different this time.
I undressed quickly as he watched me patiently. “So beautiful. Don’t be shy. We’ve done this before.” He smiled and climbed back on the bed.
I turned and pressed my hands to the bed, arching my back as he reached for me and ran his hands over my sides, squeezing the top of my ass in the process of touching everywhere.
I groaned and pressed back against him as he nudged my entrance with the thick head of his cock. “Yes, please,” I mumbled and closed my eyes, imagining him still standing there, his body everything I wanted pressed deep inside mine.
He chuckled and ran his strong hands up to my shoulders, gripping them tightly as he pressed into me. We shared a long groan, and I gripped the sheets tightly as he pulled out of me and pressed back in.
“You’re still so tight,” he whispered against the back of my shoulder as he leaned over me, diving in deeper that time.
I cried out, and he paused. “No. I’m good. It’s just a lot.” I panted softly and pressed back, offering myself to him as he reached up and caressed my breasts with one hand.
His lips were soft against the side of my neck, and he rolled his hips forward, fucking me so much deeper than I thought possible. My stomach tightened as electricity shot from my center, racing through my upper body and leaving me locked in depravity.
“That’s it, Jenna. Take everything you need from me, baby.”
I rocked against him, massaging his thick shaft with my body and giving myself over to the intensity of our position. He moved back and gripped my ass hard as he lifted up and pressed fully inside me.
The deep pulsing of his cock between my legs had the world spinning. “Fuck. I’m so close, and we just started. It’s the position.”
“We can change it if you want.” I pressed my forehead to the bed as he worked me a little more, his hands shaking, his grunts low and beautifully erotic.
“I need to. I want to see you when I come.” He moved back, and I turned, lying down on my back and welcoming him into my arms as he pressed himself flush against me and drove his cock to the hilt inside me.
I groaned and gripped his strong shoulders as he brushed my hair back and leaned down for a long, demanding kiss. I kept my legs wrapped around his taut waist as the headboard beat against the wall.
“Look at me.” He pulled back and rocked against me as pleasure budded in my stomach again. Was it possible to come twice during sex? Fuck. I was going to find out if it was.
Derek’s eyes burned into me. I looked up at him. His jaw was clenched, and face was contorted in sheer pleasure as he locked eyes with me.
This wasn’t like other times. This was a marking. I recognized that possessive look lingering in Derek’s eyes before they slipped closed against the pleasure wracking his body. My hands wandered down to grip at the firmness of his ass as I urged him to give me more, to fuck me harder. Each pounding thrust brought me closer and closer to the edge.
“Derek.” I moaned loudly and pulled him down for a long kiss, letting my moans get lost in his mouth as he pumped in and out of me, leaving me riding high.
He went rigid as a board and let out a mangled gasp before collapsing on the bed next to me. I closed my eyes and let out a long sigh, fully sated by him. The fear that he would walk away without a word raced through me, but I forced it out. This time would be different. It had to be.
One of his hands reached out to gently massage my inner thigh. I forced down that uneasy feeling and glanced over at him, his beautiful body stretched out and flush, his cock wet and still twitching. We can’t keep doing this. The realization hit me hard. The line between casual sex was now blurred, and I had no idea if Derek realized that yet.
“I have to go into the station today,” Derek said once he caught his breath. “Check emails and things like that.” He turned to look at me. “Will you be okay here alone?”
“I have to go back to my house,” I said. “I need to shower, get clothes, and take care of things over there.”
Derek’s face tightened into an uneasy frown. “I don’t know if that—”
“I know Leon’s patterns better than anyone,” I said, sitting up to rub at the chill on my skin. “He won’t be back today. I promise. He doesn’t want me to figure things out.”
“I’ll have a car drive by every hour,” Derek said a bit warily. “Keep the doors locked, though, until I get back.”
I waited on the front porch until Derek had cleared every room. He kissed me on the forehead briefly before I stepped inside to lock the front door. I sank against it the second I heard Derek’s truck roar down the street.
I was falling for him in middle of a shitty situation. I rubbed at my eyes tiredly. Derek didn’t need all this drama. He had made it clear from the start that he didn’t want a committed relationship, but things had shifted. I’d felt that shift when Derek had reached out wordlessly to hold me in the middle of the night.
The warmth of the sunlight filtered through the small glass window above the door. It warmed a patch of my cold skin.
My phone buzzed from inside my purse. I reached forward to fish it out, glancing down at the caller ID before I answered.
“You okay, Mom?”
“Of course I am,” Anna said impatiently. “Why wouldn’t I be okay? It’s you that I worry about being in that house all alone.”
“I’m fine,” I replied, sinking against the front door again. “Derek is having a cop drive by every hour until he figures something out.”
“I’m relieved to hear that, but, honey, I think I figured out how Leon found you.”
I straightened up at that. The warm patch of sunlight lifted when I drew my knees up to my chest to hug them tightly.
“How?” I asked thickly. “You’re all the way in Lone Tree. He couldn’t have put the pieces together that easily.”
“My passwords for my banking information have changed, Jenna. All of it has been changed, including my emails.”
I went cold again, colder than before. If Leon had managed to hack into my mother’s information, it wouldn’t surprise me. He worked for a software coding company back in California. He could easily hack into someone’s accounts, and knowing my mother, most of her passwords contained names Leon knew.
My fingers tightened around the phone. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” she said solemnly. “I hadn’t checked in a while, but I tried a few times this morning to check on a few things. You don’t sound surprised.”
“If that’s what he did, I’m not at all.” I chewed on my bottom lip anxiously. “We need to tell the police if that’s the case. I don’t know if it’s a crime to hack into someone’s personal accounts, but there has to be something there that they can do.”
“Derek would be able to tell us, right?”
I hesitated in answering. I didn’t want to get into the details of how I felt about Derek, because my mother had a knack for inserting herself into things. My love life happened to be a place she liked to frequent given what had happened with Leon.
“Maybe,” I said. “I’ll see when he gets back.”
“You sound hesitant,” Anna said. “What is going on?”
“Nothing is going on,” I replied quickly. “I’m just tired is all, Mom. I don’t want to talk about it. I’ll call you when Derek gets back.”
I hung up before she could reply. My head thudded back against the front door. How much more complicated could things get?
Chapter Eighteen
Derek
“All the passwords have been changed. Every single one of them is changed.” Anna handed the computer over to me. “Is there a way we can see if he changed it?”
“It’s possible,” I said, but I had my doubts that Leon had left trails. He built computer software for a living from what Jenna had told me on the drive up to Lone Tree. He was computer savvy, and that made him that much harder to track. It would be hard to prove it had been him, but I kept that information to myself.
The stone patio area was warm from the high sun. I gazed up at the mountains, where the faintest color of yellow could be seen. That was always a sign of a change in weather— the mountains. The smell of French fries filled the afternoon air.
Jenna sat quietly next to me with her gaze fixated on something in the distance that I couldn’t see. There were dark circles under her eyes. She had barely slept last night. I had felt her tossing and turning all night while mumbling under her breath. The nightmare this morning had been so vivid that I had firmly believed Leon had gotten into my house somehow without alerting me.
“There’s an email from my relator on there,” Anna said, tapping the computer with a manicured finger. “It has the address and everything on there. If he hacked into my email account, that’s how he found out where Jenna was. Can I charge him with something?”
I smiled grimly.
“It’s not that easy,” I said. “It’s virtually impossible to prove Leon’s hand in this. He could’ve guessed your passwords if he knows your family well enough.”
“He does,” Anna said. Determination filled her eyes. “He knows our family, but he got into my banking information. Isn’t that some sort of crime?”
“It is, but a hard one to prove. If he took money without your permission, that’s a different story.” I fixed Anna with a hard stare. “From what Jenna told me, all your passwords are the same except for a few numbers. Anyone can figure that out. No money is missing, correct?”
“Correct,” Anna said reluctantly. “I guess you’re right. There is no way to prove his involvement, is there?”
“Not unless he took money out of your account,” I said.
“He wouldn’t take my mother’s money,” Jenna said quietly. “He’s too smart to know that would tip the police off. He changed the passwords just to aggravate my mother.”
“He succeeded,” Anna said. She fanned herself moodily with her large sun hat while a waitress stopped by to refill our water. “Perhaps the restraining order will scare him off again? He didn’t like jail the first time around.”
“He won’t stop,” Jenna said. She traced the rim of her water glass before scooting her chair back suddenly. “Excuse me. I have to go to the bathroom.”
I reached out to touch her hot forearm, but Jenna tugged her arm back. The gesture stung more than I wanted to think about. She never pulled back from me. It was me always pulling away from her. I watched her petite frame in her simple white dress navigate through the tables on the patio to the restaurant doors.
“Forgive my daughter,” Anna said, also watching her with a sad smile. “She has a tendency to get into these moods that take her down. It’s better to give her some space to think.”
“She has a lot to deal with,” I said a bit coolly. I had no problem with Anna. She was involved in Jenna’s life in all the right ways, but I got the impression she wanted to treat the situation with a magic wand. “Mrs. Collins, I have to be honest with you. This isn’t a situation you can fix by using every legal weapon you know. Things like that don’t stop men like Leon.”
“I’m aware of that.” Her face squinted up into a pained expression. “What can you do when your child is in danger? You’re a parent.” She looked at me intently. “What would you do if your child called you in the middle of the night from the hospital with a concussion and two broken ribs?”
I closed Anna’s laptop with a resigned sigh. “I’d do everything I could to protect my son,” I said, and scooted the computer toward her. “I understand where you are coming from as a parent, but I am coming from a law-enforcement prospective. I’ve dealt with cases like this. Jenna is doing everything she can do to get away. That’s all you can do.”
“And what exactly is your relationship with my daughter, Mr. Summers?”
“Excuse me?”
The question threw me off. I knew Anna was well aware that Jenna and I had a more-than-friendly relationship, but I didn’t expect the question to be asked.
Anna smiled at me knowingly.
“I can see that there is something going on,” she said, folding her hands in front of her. “I didn’t approve at first because Jenna has a habit of picking men who are not the greatest for her. She’s always had these fantasies in her head. I tried to discourage her from being around you, but here we are.”
I eyed her warily. “I mean this respectfully, but what is your point behind all of that?”
“I can see that you care more than what you’re probably aware of, and it’s messing with my daughter’s already troubled head. That is my point.”
“I respect Jenna,” I said, torn between defending myself and accepting that observation. “I have tried telling her to go to school, to get a different job, but she—”
“Won’t do it,” Anna finished for me in a resolute tone. “I imagine she won’t do anything without a fight, but you have to agree with me: She’s too young to be settling down to just watch your son at night.”
I had a feeling where this conversation was going to lead. I sipped at my water while Anna watched me from underneath the rim of her sun hat.
“I don’t mean to be overbearing,” she said. “I just worry that my daughter will find herself stuck in another situation she can’t get out of. She’s a smart girl. She is capable of whatever she decides to do with her life.”
“She is very smart,” I agreed. “However, Jenna’s an adult. She’ll do what she wants to do despite what I say, or what you say. Obviously.”
To my surprise, Anna burst into amused laughter.
“You’re right about that,” she said. “She’s proven me wrong at every turn of her life since day one.” She patted me on the back of the hand with damp fingers. “Just promise me that you will convince her to think about her options.”
Even if it means leaving me. I read that last unspoken sentiment in Anna’s gaze. I nodded wordlessly before getting up from the table to go search for Jenna.
“Excuse me,” I said. “I have to use the restroom as well.”
I stepped past several tables of older couples who were lunching together. Their warm laughter sounded harsh compared to the conversation still replaying in the back of my head. I spotted Jenna’s slender figure at the bar, nursing a glass of red wine.
“I’m sorry I left you with her,” she said, a pained look crossing her face. “My mother… God, I love her, but she’s overbearing sometimes.”
“That’s an understatement,” I said. I ordered a whiskey when the bartender breezed by us.
Jenna arched a knowing eyebrow. “Did she corner you about being a man and letting me go?”
The first sip of whiskey burned my throat, but I let out a relieved sigh. I sat down on the barstool next to Jenna with a grimace.
“Somewhat,” I said. “I do agree with her on a few things though.”
“Like what?” Jenna sipped her wine.
“About you going to college,” I said, leveling a stern look at her when she glanced away from me. “What is holding you back from that?”
Tracing the rim of her wine glass, Jenna stared down at the contents of her glass for a long time. A soft breeze fluttered the long strands of her hair whenever someone opened the patio doors. I waited patiently for her to answer.
“I just never felt smart enough to go to college,” she said, refusing to look up at me. “I like to paint and draw. Does that really require a college degree?”
I didn’t buy it. There was something else that turned her away from the idea of going back, and I had no intention of being the reason why she didn’t go back.
“Did Leon ruin that for you?” I asked quietly.
Jenna didn’t answer, and nor did she get the chance too. The patio door opened, followed by the sound of Anna calling out our names.
“Don’t drink so much wine,” she scolded Jenna, eyeing the glass in her hand. “Alcohol makes you do irrational things.”
As soon as Anna turned her back to head back outside, Jenna downed the rest of her wine in one gulp. I couldn’t help it. Laughter escaped my lips at the sight of Jenna shooting her mother a dirty look.
Two hours later, we drove back to the city to pick up Owen from school. He chatted happily with Jenna about what he had learned at school, and it gave me plenty of time to admire the woman sitting in the seat next to me. The long strands of her hair were curly and flying about her face freely. She smiled whenever she turned around to talk to Owen. She truly was a beautiful woman inside and out. Something in my chest clenched at that observation.
While I got ready for work, I heard Owen start up his Xbox despite having told him to start on his homework. My bedroom door opened a minute later.
“I told him only ten minutes,” Jenna said, closing the door behind her. “I just wanted to thank you for everything you’ve done over the past couple of days.” She looked down at her feet then. “You didn’t have to help me.”
“I’m here to help,” I said. “It’s going against my nature if I don’t help people.”
The corner of her lips quirked up. “And yet people think you’re an asshole.”
I chuckled at that as she rounded the bed to wrap her arms around me. I relished the feeling of Jenna’s tight body pressing up against mine in all the right ways. Desire skittered through me when she stood on her tiptoes to kiss me. In just a few minutes, I was hard and ready to bury myself in the sweet warmth between Jenna’s legs.
I pulled away briefly. “You said that Owen just started that game downstairs?”
“Yes.” She blinked up at me. “Why?”
Hooking my fingers in the fabric of her dress, I tugged it up over her hips. Her eyes widened in surprise before desire filled them. I used one hand to tug her panties down to her knees before twisting her around to grip the edge of the bed. This position was quickly becoming my favorite because of the depth I could get to inside her and the beautiful view it gave me of her ass.
I opened my fly and pulled out my cock, reaching for her and not thinking twice about making her mine again for the moment. I was falling for her. Sex was an outflow of that emotion. I pressed deep into her tight wetness and gripped her shoulder with one hand while caressing her back and ass with the other.
We both let out stifled moans of pleasure. I set a hard and quick pace, well aware that Owen could pop up at any point. The heat, the tightness…it was hard to concentrate on reaching around to rub at the bundle of wet nerves between Jenna’s legs, but I forced myself to think about her first. She’d come with me fucking her hard and fast from behind, my cock head slamming into her G-spot, but I wanted it to be explosive. She stiffened as I tapped her clit, her back going rigid
“Derek,” she whispered roughly before giving herself over to me. Her fingers buried themselves in the sea of blankets while she dropped her head into them to keep quiet.
The sweet muscles of her pussy clenched tightly around me as she bounced backward, her ass jiggling beautifully. She pressed her face to the bed and let out a long scream as she tucked her hips and massaged me with her body. The spasm that wracked Jenna’s frame was intense, breathtaking. She let out a muffled groan into the bedsheets before I let myself find release as well. It was over just as it began, but a sated feeling washed over me. I savored the feeling of Jenna for a moment longer before pulling back. Brushing the hair from her neck tenderly, I leaned down to press a kiss against the salty and flushed skin there.
“You’re so sexy, Jenna. I love the way you open up for me. I fit perfectly inside you, baby.” I kissed her skin again and squeezed her perfect ass before standing up. Realization rolled over me in thick waves.
I couldn’t give Jenna up no matter how hard I tried. It was just damn impossible, and for that brief second, I understood exactly why Leon didn’t want to let go of her. I didn’t want to let go of her either.