Page 104 of Ruined Vows

But there’s a big gap at the bottom between the door and the linoleum, so I quickly drop to my knees and press my ear to the crack as much as I can with my face squished to the floor.

“—can’t you just fucking say you love me back? Is it because you care what all your dumb friends would say? We don’t have tocareabout that anymore, Professor. Let’s just disappear for the summer. My dad’s got a place on the beach in Galveston. He’s taking the bitch to Europe for the summer, so no one will even find us!”

“Oh wow, Phillip,” comes Kira’s strained voice. “This is just a lot. So fast. I don’t know what to say.”

“Say you’ll come with me.”

“First, can you put away the knife, honey? I really don’t like knives.”

That little motherfucker. Which one is he? Curls? Or the Timothy McVeigh wannabe? Not that it matters. He’s about to be nothing but a bag of bones.

I hop up from the floor, careful to be quiet about it, and grab my Leatherman from its holster on my belt. I pull out one of the tiny tools and have the lock picked in thirty seconds but don’t open the door immediately.

I drop back down to listen to the voices again, clocking where in the room the little peckerwood is standing.

Then I reach up to open the door and launch myself into the room in one motion.

I charge the piss-ant threatening Kira, eyes on his hands to watch for the knife. He fumbles to raise it, but he’s not nearly fast enough.

I quick-jab my fist into his wrist. He drops it and screams in pain before I sucker punch him in the guts, doubling him over.

He doesn’t even put up a fight when I grab one wrist and then the other and yank them behind his back.

It was Curls after all. I knew this kid wasn’t right from the first day I saw him eyeing Kira in class.

“Check him for zip ties,” Kira says, pressing herself back against her bookcase, eyes wide as she breathes hard.

Did he touch her? I’ll kill the little fucker if he put a finger on her.

I’m already checking all his pockets for weapons anyway, so I also feel around for zip ties.

He’s busy spluttering. “You can’t do this to me! I have rights!”

“Call the cops,” I tell Kira.

I wrestle the string bean kid out of her office and slam him to the ground on his stomach in the hallway. He shrieks and starts crying. I can’t believe this is the little bitch that’s had Kira so on edge and scared all these weeks. I keep his wrists held tight in one hand while I yank off my belt with the other.

“Hello?” Kira’s saying in the background. “Yes. My name is Kira Roberts. A student just attacked me in my office in the Psychology building at UT Dallas. I’m in office 335, third floor.”

“I didn’t attack you,” Phillip shouts. “I love you! Why are you being such a bitch?”

I knock his head lightly against the tile. “Hey! Learn some fucking manners.”

He just starts crying again as I loop my belt around his wrists, yanking ittight. I keep him on his belly until the cops show up ten minutes later.

FORTY

ISAAK

“Thank you, ma’am,”says the officer, tucking away his note pad. “We’ll follow up with you if we have any more questions.”

“Thank you,” Kira whispers, eyes coming to me like they have so often over the last couple hours while cops poured onto campus, took Phillip into custody, partitioned off the crime scene, and pulled each of us aside for questioning.

She looks like she’s about to drop, and all I want is to pull her into my arms.

No. I have to forcibly stop my arms from moving.You aren’t like that anymore. She’s getting married next week.

I wince and drop my head. Now that her stalker’s been found, my job is up. I figured things would be done after the wedding, but now…

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