Page 37 of Sick Little Devotion

As soon as I catch this motherfucker, it will be.

Chapter Seventeen

SAHARA

Iknow there are things that Aiden’s not telling me. I don’t believe that everything is okay, but I do think that he believes that he can solve whatever it is. That’s Aiden. That’s how he’s always been. He solves his problems and fights his battles on his own. I let him go without questioning him further. But I won’t lie—it drives another wedge between us. And we don’t need any more of them.

I dress in a pair of gray sweatpants and a T-shirt and head downstairs. I am intrigued by what the kitchen might hold. I’m not let down. When Aiden said it was stocked, he really meant it. I sift through all the meal-prepped, homemade meals, landing on some sort of Italian dish. I place it in the microwave and then take a seat at the bar, alone.

I can’t help but wonder what the girls are up to. Are they missing me? I would like to think that they are, but I might never know. I spend the next hour finishing my food and letting my mind wander—though I don’t let it run back to the past.

After I finish eating, I clean up the dish and put it away. I check the time, having half-expected Aiden to return. But he doesn’t. I spend the next three hours watching two different movies that I find on TV. I can barely concentrate on them as I wait, my anxiety growing. Where did he go?

Finally, just as I’m about to start a third film, I hear the door open from the garage. I jump to my feet and rush through the kitchen to see Aiden and a man I don’t recognize stepping through the opening. Their jeans are muddy, and they look disheveled.

“This cabrón is a sly motherfucker,” the stranger says in a drawn-out Hispanic accent. He rubs his bald head as he says the words. However, when he meets my gaze, he smiles.

“Ah, the wife is waiting, I see.”

“I’ll meet you upstairs, Sara,” Aiden tells me, his voice flat. “I need to finish up with Carlos first.”

“Where were you?” I ask, ignoring his command. I’m not his property to control and command. “You were gone a long time.”

Carlos raises his brows. “Uh, she’s feisty.”

“Go upstairs,” Aiden warns me, his gaze darkening. “Now.”

“Tell me where you were,” I throw back at him, ignoring the chuckle of amusement that slips from Carlos. “I deserve to know where you were. You said you would be right back, and you weren’t.”

“It took the time it took,” Aiden growls through gritted teeth.

I shake my head at him but don’t argue. Instead, I thunder back toward the bedroom like a pissed-off teenager. I don’t know why it bothers me, but maybe it’s the fact that I feel as if I’m stuck here, while he gets to do whatever he wants—without having to tell me about it.

It’s a reminder that I’m nothing other than a captive, no matter how romantic the sex seems. I burst into tears as soon as I reach the bedroom, and I slam the door behind me. Face down in the pillow, I let all the emotions out. This is the new Aiden rearing his ugly head. The old Aiden never would’ve talked to me like that.

He never would’ve kidnapped me.

He never would’ve fucked me and then pretended like I was his property.

I wrap my arms around myself and wonder what I’m doing. Why I’m even here? I spent the last seven years lost in the past, wishing that Aiden would show up again. Well now, he is back, and I don’t know if he’s the same man that left me. In fact, I know he’s not. But the glimpses I get of him spark hope, while the darkness in him draws me in.

Fuck you, Aiden.

The thought brings forth more tears, and I can’t help but think back to that painful night when I went looking for him. He hadn’t climbed into my window like he always did, and, in hindsight, I should’ve noticed that something was wrong. I’d found him outside a couple of streets over, nearly passed out in one of the neighborhood alleys.

As soon as we got back to my room, I noticed the changes in him. He was different somehow. His eyes were sunken in, and the dark circles around them were obvious. I remember thinking that he was starting to look like my mother. I’d been terrified when I’d seen him like that, stumbling around in my room and unable to get a hold of himself.

“I don’t deserve you, Sara,” he says, falling to the floor with a thud. “I never fucking deserved you. I thought I was getting everything just right for us—for the future—but I’m worse off than I’ve ever been.”

“What do you mean?” I kneel beside him, placing my hand over his. “If something is wrong, you just have to tell me. I can help you. I—”

“No one can help me, Sara.”

“You’ve been out of this house for a year…”

“Yeah, and I still couldn’t erase all that’s happened to me. The images of it just keep haunting me. They find me wherever I am, Sara. And ruin my life.”

“It’s just the pills talking,” I choke out the words, tears streaming down my face. “You have to stop using them. They won’t make you feel better.”