Page 118 of The Monster and the Masochist

Alexa Play: Miracle by Bad Omens

Theo didn’t come back.

Not for hours.

It was almost three am by the time I heard the elevator ding, and I shot up in bed at the sound.

It’s not like I’d slept at all anyway.

When she hadn’t returned by nine, I’d texted her, and she hadn’t even opened it.

I called her twice at ten, and it went right to voicemail.

At eleven, I’d dressed and left the condo, driving to the venue I knew she trained at, only to find it locked up and deserted. Her car wasn’t in the parking lot. No cars were.

I’d even swung by Fairview on my way home, but her car hadn’t been there either.

Not having any idea of where else she could be, I’d returned home, completely at my wits’ end and nearly in a full-blown panic.

‘We will find her. She cannot hide from us,’ my monster reassured me, but it wasn’t making me feel any better.

I wanted to find her now.

But outside of driving up and down the streets of Silent Hollow looking for her, I didn’t even know where to start.

So, I’d resolved to wait in case she came home, and I missed her because I was out aimlessly driving around looking for her.

Relief like I’d never known flooded through me as her silhouette appeared in the doorway to our room, but it was immediately replaced with concern as I realized she was moving in these awkward, jerky motions.

“Theo?” I asked softly. She jumped, stumbling slightly, before releasing a weird little giggle that made all the tiny hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

“What’re you doin’ up, princess? It’s late.”

“I know it’s fucking late. It’s almost three am. What were you doing out until three am on a weeknight? Don’t you have that big fight or something tomorrow with that chick, DeLuca, or whatever her name is?”

I couldn’t see her very well in the dark. She seemed to be having a hard time seeing, too, considering she kept bumping into shit and stumbling as she made her way toward the bathroom.

“DeLuca’s a lil’ bitch. I’m naht worried ‘bout fightin’ ‘er,” she slurred, and that was when I realized she was drunk.

“Are you… Are you fucking wasted right now?” I asked in disbelief, just as she stumbled almost face-first into the bathroom door.

“Just a lil tipsy…” she mumbled as her knees hit the floor. I leaped out of bed and rushed to help her up.

She was definitely more than a little tipsy. Once I managed to get the light on in the bathroom and had a chance to look at her face, I realized she was so drunk she might literally not even remember this conversation tomorrow… or I guess later today, considering it was three fucking am.

“Why?!”

“Had s’me pops with Jerry…”

I frowned.

I didn’t know much about Theo’s world, but I felt like getting drunk with your athlete before a big fight was pretty shitty coaching behavior on Jerry’s part.

“You’re going to be a mess tomorrow. How are you going to fight properly if you’re all hungover?” I asked, doing my best to keep her from falling again as she mindlessly struggled to get to the shower.

She was fumbling with her clothes, stripping as she half walked, half crawled across the bathroom floor. The sight of her so wrecked sent another terrifying chill through my bones.

“Wait… Did you drive like this?!”