Page 75 of Under My Skin

“Let’s do a café con leche. I think I might end up having a heart attack if I do another straight shot like that.”

“Fair,” she giggled. “Also, I’ve got tiramisu, carrot cake, sticky mango, and spiced pear overnight oats. Which one do you want?”

I turned to look at her, raising my eyebrows in shock. “And here I thought I was just going to be eating boring cold oatmeal. Surprise me.”

Just as she grabbed two mason jars out of the fridge, there was a knock at the door. She furrowed her brow before heading out of the kitchen with me on her tail. I knew she would have told me if she was expecting anyone else, and with us still not being able to prove definitively that Vicki was my stalker, I wasn’t about to take chances.

“Let me look and see who it is before you answer,” I murmured. “Just to be safe.”

Dani nodded and stepped aside, and I glanced through the peephole to find a very worried-looking Leo on the other side. I opened the door, and he immediately stepped inside before I quickly closed and locked it behind him.

“What’s wrong, Leo?” Dani asked before I could.

He sighed and looked back and forth between us. “Brian and I just clocked a red Tesla driving through the parking lot. It happened too fast for us to get a shot of the plate to confirm, but… Anyway, just to be safe, for the time being, I think we need to change the protocol to have one person up here with you and the other down in the parking lot.”

Fuck.

My stomach dropped to the floor and my head started spinning as I realized I’d been the cause of this. By confronting Vicki, by getting her fired from her job, I’d made her even more dangerous. At least when she’d been working as my publicist, she’d had to be in the office forty hours a week. But now? Now she had nothing but time. Time and an unhealthy, dangerous obsession with me.

I turned and strode back over to the table, turning my partially charged phone back on. As soon as it powered up, my text notification sounded. With a sinking feeling in my gut, I checked it and found a picture of my Escalade parked downstairs, accompanied by a message.

Blocked

I told you to stay away from that whore, Braden. I told you I don’t share. But you didn’t listen. Maybe you’ll finally understand when I get rid of her and that little sniveling brat. I won’t let ANYONE stand in the way of our love.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

DANIELA

TWO WEEKS LATER

“So,Drew starts harassing me about whether I was, quote, breaking in the new players, and then he looked at Braden and asked if I was sleeping with him too. Or sleeping with him and Ian together,” Kyler recounted, rolling her eyes.

“Oh, my God. What a pig,” I practically growled.

I had no idea how this casual, friendly conversation had turned to the subject of the horrifyingly awful thing that had happened to Kyler in high school and the way the entire school had turned against her after it happened. At least she hadn’t had to go into too much detail since Morgan had told me a little about Kyler’s documentary, but still. All I’d asked was what Braden was like in high school.

“No arguments there,” she said. “But without missing a beat, Braden looks over at Drew and goes, ‘When would I have time for that? I’ve been too busy fucking your mom.’”

As the whole room broke into a fit of laughter, I turned to look at my boyfriend, who was bright red as he laughed right along with us. But the thing was, that was just sohim. Findinga way to defend someone he cared about while at the same time completely humiliating the person who’d dared to cross her. I had absolutely no problem picturing it.

“You forgot the part where he remembered what kind of sheets Drew had on his bed from the time he’d mowed their lawn and had to go inside to take a piss,” Ian snickered. “He sold that shit so well, evenIbought it for a minute.”

“And I have never lived it down,” Braden half-laughed, half-groaned. “Especially not the part where the asshole had a sister named Stacy.”

“Guys! Little ears,” Melissa mock scolded as she let Isaac grab hold of her finger while cradling him in her arms.

I snorted. “You do realize that with Braden as his dad, I’ll be lucky if his first word isn’t ‘fuck,’ right?”

“True story,” Morgan chuckled. “Good thing he has his Auntie Morgan here to teach him hownotto curse like a sailor.”

“Um, excuse you. You’re just as bad,” Melissa giggled, playfully elbowing her cousin in the ribs.

“Yeah, but unlike B, I know how to tone it down.”

Isaac’s crying interrupted the conversation, and I went to get up, but Braden stopped me.

“Let me get him this time,” he said, stealing a quick kiss before getting up and taking our son from his friend.

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