Page 17 of Black Heart

He could be anyone. A pervert. A greasy, elderly, moth-bitten man. Yet I, the large, scarred man who saved me, all angles, muscle and jagged lines, came into my mind the minute I cupped my breast, and then it never left.

It’s him I pleasured myself for.

And holy shit, that is so unlike me.

Maybe that’s why I’m out here now, driving as if for the first time,adrenaline shooting out of my hands and throat and into the road ahead.

I’m so consumed by what I’ve done and who I put myself on display for, that it takes me a full three minutes to figure out if this watcher outfitted my home, he sure as fuck would’ve put a GPS device on my car.

“Shit!” I pull over to the side of the road, slamming on the brakes.

My phone pings the instant I turn the engine off.

“Double-fuck,” I hiss.

Clambering out of the driver’s side, I pull the SIM card out of my phone then throw both on the ground, stomping on them multiple times.

See, this is why one should never record naked or sexual videos of themselves. The possible repercussions become so mentally all-consuming, you then make stupid goddamned mistakes like me.

With all possible electronic monitoring behind me, I race into the surrounding forest, scrambling over rocks, downed branches, and bushes full of thorns.

I don’t hike. My hobbies include napping and reading, so with only my wits about me and a visual map of Greycliff in my mind, I take a circuitous route through the outskirts of town, staying off the path and the full moon to give me guidance.

Within fifteen minutes, I can’t breathe. I’m used to computers as my muse, my mouse as my movement, my mind as the ultimate weapon.

But here in the forest, my body is in charge.

And it sucks.

“Keep moving,” I heave out to myself, forcing my legs to push forward despite the agony coursing through them as I trek up a sharp incline.

The ground beneath me is treacherous, uneven, threatening to trip me up at every turn. But I have no choice. The fear of what might happen if I stop is far worse than any pain I’m currently experiencing.

The farther in I go, the darker it gets, and I curse my decision to seek refuge in this godforsaken forest. In my haste to escape, I’d failed to consider just how disorientating it would be to navigate through the oppressive gloom. I can barely see a foot in front of me, let alone find my way back to civilization.

“Stupid, stupid,stupid,” I mutter under my breath, my voice shaking as much as my body. Yet, even as I chastise myself, I know I couldn’t have stayed where I was. Not with him watching me.

Branches claw at me, tearing at my clothes and scratchingmy skin. The once comforting chirps of forest creatures have given way to an eerie quiet that leaves me exposed and vulnerable. It’s as though the very trees are conspiring, closing in from all sides and trapping me within their suffocating embrace.

My pulse hammers in my ears, ragged breaths escaping my lips. But still, I listen, praying for some indication that I’ve managed to put enough distance between myself and the man who’s haunted my every waking moment for the past forty-eight hours.

“Please,” I sob, my voice barely more than a breath as the weight of my terror threatens to crush me.

I was so brave with my hacking skills, so cunning with my erotic idea to escape. Now? Not so much.

But even as the words leave my lips, cold tendrils of fear wrap around my chest. Because deep down, I know that it’s only a matter of time before he catches up with me. And when he does...

I force myself not to think about what might happen next, focusing instead on putting one foot in front of the other. It’s all I can do to keep moving, to keep fighting for the chance to escape this sudden nightmare.

“Keep moving,” I urge myself again, trying to ignore the fear that rises within me like bile in my throat. “You have to keep moving.”

And so I break into an uneven run, my body fumbling with exhaustion and terror, my mind filled with awful thoughts of the man who shadows my every step. The invisible man who will soon overtake me.

I hear it.

The sound of a twig snapping not too far behind me. The knowledge that he’s out there, relentlessly pursuing me with his uncanny tracking skills, sends relentless shudders into mybones. The fear grips me tighter, making it hard to even wheeze.

My legs grow weaker by the second. Panic threatens to consume me entirely. My mind is a jumbled mess of thoughts, a jumble of emotions crashing against each other like waves upon the shore. But above all else, I feel betrayal—the bitter sting of my smarmy supervisor who put me in a position where I’m being hunted down like prey.