I nod my head as I tuck my paperback novel into the cubbie under the counter. He wants me gone. He doesn’t want to talk about this, and I don’t blame him.
I pull the drawstrings on my hood a bit tighter and exit through the rear entrance. I hear the click of Aasif locking the door behind me and I stare at it for a moment, trying to figure out who would threaten his family. Initially, I believed it was my father because I refused to believe Daimon would care enough about me to do something like that. And his hasty exit from my apartment six days ago sort of proved his apathy. But now I don’t know what to think.
Especially now that I remember a customer in a dark hoodie driving a gold Mercedes just like the one I saw the first night I saw Daimon. But it doesn’t make sense. Why would Daimon kill someone who was driving his car? He said it was a known sexual predator in that car. Unless, the predator just happened to have the same car as him. Or the man I saw at the gas station two months ago wasn’t Daimon.
It’s too much of a coincidence to be unrelated. And now Aasif and his family have been pulled into this. But why does this person care if I still work at the gas station? What does all of this have to do with me?
I turn away from the back door of the snack shack and head for the sidewalk. It’s four a.m. The sun won’t come up for another two to three hours. These are the hours of absolute darkness, when I should feel most at ease. But I’ve never felt more uncertain about walking home alone.
Then I see it. For the first time in a month, I see my father’s silver Audi S4 parked about a block and a half farther down Hope Street. I get a strange urge to wave at him. To let him know that I see him. That I appreciate him. And that, despite his mistakes, I love him.
But I can’t. Because a larger part of me still wishes he would have been a better father. Teaching your child to fight isn’t a sufficient means of showing affection. I needed to know that I wasn’t a monster. I needed to know that I was loved. And I still don’t know if my father loves me. All I know is that he loved the fighting machine he created. He loved that machine, then he kicked it to pieces and threw it away.
I continue walking down Hope, watching as the glowing cherry of my father’s cigarette flies out the driver’s side window and he drives away. I shake my head. He still hasn’t quit. The last few years I lived at home, I had to go easy on my dad during sparring matches. All that tar in his lungs was slowing him down. I tried to make sure he didn’t know I was going easy on him, but I’m sure there were times he suspected it. Those times when he’d cut a match short and chew me out for doing something wrong. Punishing me for his own shortcomings.
Isn’t that what we always do? Punish others for our own weaknesses. Maybe that’s what Daimon is doing to me. Maybe he hasn’t come to visit me in six days because he recognized some weakness in himself while he was with me.
It’s a long shot, but it would make me feel better. Like I hadn’t been used.
Still, I find it hard to believe that a man like Daimon would go to all that trouble to use a woman for sex just once. He killed someone in front of me; someone who was possibly driving his own car. Then he came to my door and introduced himself as a detective, which I didn’t believe for a single second. Until I contacted the Los Angeles Police Department yesterday.
They confirmed to me twice that they do indeed have a Detective Daimon Rousseau in their department and that he works the Hope Street area. They wanted to know if I had a complaint about him or if I had some information for any of his cases. I told them I did not have a complaint and that I’d call Detective Rousseau directly to give him my tip.
I knew if I called from my home phone, Daimon would know it was me. So I called from a pay phone on Wilshire and disguised my voice. The fact that I have to go to such lengths to find out more about the man who ravaged me six days ago is disturbing. I willingly granted him access to the deepest parts of me and he thanks me by pretending I no longer exist.
I’m near the place where my father was parked just a few minutes ago. I look at the black asphalt and immediately see the cigarette butt he tossed out the window. The cherry is still barely giving off a thin stream of smoke. I gaze at it for a moment, trying to figure something out. Then I step off the curb, take two steps into the street, and pick it up.
Holding the cigarette butt up in the air, I smile as the streetlight shines down on it. Then I tuck it into my pocket and head home.
Chapter Nine
Never underestimate the lengths a person will go to for revenge. My father said those words to me the day I left. I didn’t understand if this was a threat or a warning. Who would ever want to exact revenge against a girl who’d been kept in a basement for most of her life? Well, now I know that he wasn’t issuing this warning to me.
It’s been two days since I watched my father’s Audi S4 drive away and I’ve been a busy bee. I’ve been playing the part of Detective Alex Carmichael. I’d make a great detective.
After renting a car and staking out the Central Community police station on 6th Street, I finally got a tail on Detective Daimon Rousseau. Turns out he really is a detective and he either has anger issues or he takes his job way too seriously. I watched him get in a fight with another officer while walking to his car.
Or maybe he’s just stressed about something. Maybe he’s feeling the heat from that murder he committed three weeks ago.
Either way, now I know his face, from a distance. I couldn’t see much, especially when he was scuffling in the parking lot, but it’s obvious he’s handsome. He carries himself with immense poise and an air of mystery. A bit of a loner.
Even after discovering these new details about him, I still don’t feel like I know the real Daimon. But I do know he’s coming to see me tonight. I watched him walk into a flower shop earlier today. Then he drove to his swanky apartment complex in Venice Beach.
I’m ready for you, Daimon.
I’ve resisted touching myself for eight days while waiting for him to knock on my door. My body and mind are primed for a perfectly sinful reunion. Tonight will be … explosive.
I spritz the air with a heady perfume, which I’ve mixed with a vial of pheromone oil I picked up at a local lingerie shop. Then I dab a few drops on my décolletage, smiling as I say the French word aloud a few times. It rolls off my tongue naturally. I think Daimon would be impressed.
As expected, at 11:23 p.m. on my night off, I get a knock on my door. I peek through the peephole and smile. He’s wearing the usual dark hood and he’s facing away from the door. I unlock the door and walk straight toward the bedroom.
“Alex?” he calls softly when I’ve reached the corridor.
I continue into the bedroom, calling over my shoulder. “Come in, Daimon.”
I press my back up against the wall. It’s cool against my skin as I wait for him. He enters cautiously and I can’t help myself.
“Boo.”
He snaps his head toward me and I’m actually quite turned on by that black, circular shadow under his hood. The small hints of light on the top of his lips and nose are enough.
“I apologize for my absence,” he begins and I quickly reach up and press my finger to his lips.
“Shh. You don’t owe me any apologies. I’m a woman now, remember? I understand how it is. Things get busy. You get swamped at work. Blah, blah…. Explanations are for saps.”
He reaches up and grabs my wrist to pull my finger away from his mouth, then he’s silent for a moment. “If you don’t want an apology for your own peace of mind, that’s fine. But I’m offering my apology because I believe you deserve better.”
“Better than what?”
He lets go of my wrist and my hand drops to my side. Stepping forward, his hand lands on my bare waist. “Why are you nude?”
I smile and lay my hand over his so I can slide it back onto my ass. “I was waiting for you.”