Lights Out: A Dark Stalker Rom-Com

I now had the answer to the question, “How fun is it to run through the woods at night during winter?”

About as much fun as having Hannibal Lecter for a gynecologist.

My feet were soaked through because of the snow, I had so many scratches on my face from low-hanging branches that it was going to look like I’d picked a fight with a shredder, and even though it was sub-zero, I was sweating from exertion. I was both hot and freezing at the same time, and between my litany of physical discomforts and the fear and adrenaline pumping through my veins, I was so uncomfortable and wound up that I was ready to burst into tears. I wanted a hot shower, homemade chicken soup, and all the blankets in my house wrapped around me while I made a nest on my couch.

Josh looked even more miserable than I was. I couldn’t stop glancing at him in the moonlight, worried he might suddenly collapse. I’d rounded the corner of the house just in time to watch him ping-pong through the pergola, and though he swore he hadn’t hit his head, I was still wary. I knew from treating people that sometimes, in a fall like that, it all happened so fast you couldn’t be sure of everything that got hit until the bruises showed up.

Thank fuck he’d made it out of the house before getting caught. I’d tried to play it cool while he was in there, but internally, I’d been freaking out. The thought of Josh trapped inside Brad’s mansion while two of Brad’s victims lay somewhere far below made me sick to my stomach.

I didn’t know the full horror of what Josh had been through with his father, but between Tyler’s revelations and Josh’s cryptic comments, it was safe to say that having a serial killer for a parent was the stuff of nightmares. Knowing there were bodies nearby might have retraumatized Josh, and the surreptitious glances I kept sneaking at him were as much about his mental health as they were about his physical well-being.

How he’d had the wherewithal to think of setting off the alarm after everything he’d just been through was beyond me, and it made me look at him with a whole new level of admiration. Not only was my boyfriend funny and kind and hot, but he was also smart as hell. I’d never been so attracted to anyone in my life, and if not for the genuine fear of cops barreling through the woods after us, I would have dragged him to a stop, dropped to my knees in front of him, and showed him just how much I appreciated him.

He looked over at me, his face shaded because of his hat, hiding his expression from view. “The meeting point should be just beyond the next rise,” he said, keeping his voice low.

I followed suit. “Do you think they’re still waiting for us?”

Junior’s voice crackled through our earbuds, making us both jump. “We…here…are you…at?”

Josh and I shared a look and picked up the pace as we started climbing the hill. The van must have been just inside radio range.

“Can you hear us?” I asked, voice barely above a whisper.

“Not…can you…me?”

I blew out a frustrated breath and kept climbing. The snow was deep, and though the surface had frozen, it was soft underneath, and Josh and I kept punching through it and nearly stumbling. My legs protested every step. I was starting to lose feeling in my toes, which was the first sign of frostbite. We needed to get to the van and get the fuck out of there.

“How about now?” Josh asked.

“Better,” Junior said. “Can you hear me?”

If not for the fear of being overheard, I would have whooped in celebration. “Loud and clear.”

“There’s cops all over the place,” Junior said. “You set off the fucking alarm?”

“We’ll explain later,” I said. “Where are you?”

“Parked near the meeting spot. We had to get the van out of there because of what you two idiots did, so I hopped in one of the lookout cars. When you reach the road, turn right and look for a black SUV down an unlit dirt drive.”

I cringed. The plan had called for stealth and secrecy, but now any neighbors who’d seen the van at Brad’s before his parents turned up would think it was suspicious and tell the cops. At least the van hadn’t been there when Brad’s folks arrived. Junior had inherited his father’s talent for bullshitting, but I doubted that it worked on elitist snobs.

No, this situation wasn’t ideal, but in my opinion, it was still better to have cops crawling all over the area than to give Brad’s parents a chance to cover more of his crimes.

“Where are you two?” Junior asked.

I bit off a curse as my foot plunged through the snow again. “We’re coming over the –”

Josh grabbed my arm and yanked me down. “Cop car.”

A fresh wave of adrenaline punched through me as a searchlight swung over our heads, lighting up the forest like the Fourth of July. Josh and I dropped against the side of the hill, and I sent up a small prayer of thanks that we’d been just shy of the top and still able to hide. A few yards further, and we would have been caught in the open.

The beam swept across the forest once before coming back for a second, slower pass. I flattened against the snow, rocks and fallen branches digging into me, my clothes soaking through. I didn’t even breathe because I was so scared that I’d miss some warning sound that might tell us someone had gotten out of the car and was heading our way.

Josh gripped my hand, and I turned just enough to meet his eyes. Gone was the soulful brown I was used to. They were nearly black now, with a steely edge that spoke of determination. He hadn’t taken my hand to reassure me; he’d grabbed it so he could haul me to my feet at the slightest provocation.

I was right there with him. We were not getting caught. If that meant fleeing back through the woods, so be it. I suddenly had enough adrenaline coursing through my veins that I felt like I could run a marathon.

The spotlight cut through the trees again, even slower this time, painting the night in blinding white. A crunching sound reached my ears, and my pulse skyrocketed. Josh squeezed my hand, his fingers practically trembling with the need to flee.

“Wait,” I whispered, recognizing the sound for what it was: tires crunching over the salt-caked pavement as the car rolled past. We must have been closer to the road than I realized to hear that from where we were.

Josh released a shaky breath as the spotlight moved on, dropping our section of woods back into darkness.

“Fuck,” Junior bit out. “Back up! Back up!”

He must have seen the beam and realized the cops were heading their way next.

Josh and I stayed where we were, frozen in place as we listened helplessly to the noises coming through our earbuds.

“Turn!” Junior yelled.

Whatever the response was, we couldn’t hear it.

“I don’t care about your fucking paint job,” Junior said. “Back into the fucking trees if you have to.”

A scraping sound came over the line loud enough to make me wince. Goodbye, paint job.

“Cut the engine!” Junior barked.

I lifted my head just enough to see the spotlight slicing through the forest a few hundred feet past us. The trees were denser there, more conifer than broadleaf. Hopefully, they were thick enough to hide a car. I squinted, scanning the understory for any sign of light bouncing off metal. Nothing.

I glanced down and met Josh’s eyes.

“Can you see them?” he whispered.

I shook my head, but his expression remained wary. He knew what I did: just because I couldn’t see the car from our angle didn’t mean the cops couldn’t see it from theirs.

His gaze moved past me, and I knew from the unfocused look in his eyes that he wasn’t seeing the forest around us anymore. He was coming up with another escape plan if Junior and his driver got caught.

I strained my ears while Josh brainstormed, but all I could hear were my cousin’s ragged breaths. The spotlight swept over his area much like it had ours, and I kept my gaze laser-focused on it, looking for some sign of a car or an interruption in the light that might signal someone was out of the police vehicle, searching through the trees.

“I can’t see you from here,” I told Junior. “And I don’t see anyone in the woods either.”

“Keep looking,” he said, a low note in his voice that I hadn’t heard before.

Up until this moment, Junior had been brash, cocky, and controlling, but now he sounded scared, and it reminded me that he wasn’t that much older than I was. For the first time since meeting my estranged uncle and cousins, I felt a small pang of something like familial responsibility radiating from somewhere in my middle. I didn’t want Junior to get caught. And not just because Josh and I would need to find another way out of there, but because I didn’t like the idea of Junior sitting handcuffed in a jail cell.

I nearly swore. What a great time for this particular emotional response. Absolutely perfect. If those cops made a beeline for the parked car, I’d have to do something about it, and I really, really didn’t want to. I’d had enough risk for one night. Hell, for an entire lifetime.

Thankfully, it didn’t come to that. The spotlight continued rolling on, scanning further and further away until the forest almost entirely obscured it.

“Fuck,” Junior said. “That was close.”

“They’re past you?” Josh asked, sitting up.

“Yeah,” Junior answered. “You’ll have to come to us through the woods. There could be more cops out on the street.”

I got to my feet and started brushing myself off. “Crank the heat. Josh and I need to get warm to avoid frostbite.”

Josh was slower to stand, moving in a halting way that made me wonder just how hurt he was. By the time he reached his full height, he towered over me, more of a large shadow than anything else, thanks to my ruined night vision. He took my hands and leaned close enough to meet my eyes. “Are you okay?”

“My toes are numb,” I said.

“Shit. I shouldn’t have made you wait outside.”

“No, you were right about that,” I told him. “Me going in was too risky. Now, come on. We need to hurry.”

Together, we made our stumbling way through the underbrush. It was denser this close to the road than in the rest of the forest, and I kept tripping over things because of the numbness creeping up my legs. After the second time I almost fell, Josh scooped me up, bridal style.

He let out a pained grunt, and I squirmed, trying to get out of his hold.

“I’m too heavy,” I protested. “And you’re hurt.”

He shook his head, jaw clenched in a stubborn line, his gaze trained down as he placed one foot in front of the other. “I’m fine. And it’s not much further. You’re safer in my arms than on your feet right now.”

I twined my fingers behind his neck and kissed him on the cheek. “I feel safer in your arms always.”

“Gag,” Junior said, ruining the moment.

Any lingering feelings of familial warmth I felt toward him vanished.

Despite Josh’s reassurances that he was fine, getting to the SUV was still a slog. He moved carefully, either because of his injuries or his fear of tripping and toppling us back into the snow. We had to pause several times on our way through the woods, once because Junior thought he saw something and twice more because we thought we heard something. Those moments passed excruciatingly slowly while Josh and I held our breath and strained our ears.

I was so relieved when we finally reached the SUV that I nearly started sobbing, and I could tell from the shaky breath Josh released that he was equally grateful we’d made it.

The driver, an aging man named Jimmy who’d helped locate Brad’s car in my neighborhood, had a few blankets in the rear of the vehicle that he used to cover his seats when he had his dogs with him. He explained this in a low, raspy voice as he opened the rear door for us, apologizing for the wet dog smell, but I was so grateful that I couldn’t give a shit that they reeked, and I thanked him profusely for letting us use them.

Josh and I took our shoes and socks off and wrapped our feet in the blankets while Jimmy pulled out of the trees and back onto the road. There were heaters beneath the front seats, and I told Josh not to get too close to his at first because we needed to raise our skin temperature slowly. Next, we lost our sodden jackets and dried the rest of ourselves as best we could while filling my cousin in on everything that happened after his team bailed on the mission.

Junior wasn’t happy about us setting off the alarm, not even after Josh explained why he’d done it. To Junior, it was better that Brad’s family dispose of evidence than for any heat to be brought onto the power company or his dad.

Josh sent me a disgruntled look as my cousin reamed us out over our behavior, and I tilted my head toward him and dropped my voice as I said, “I told you they weren’t good people.”

By the time we made it onto the highway, my worry over the fate of our feet started to abate. Josh’s toes hadn’t gone fully numb, just tingly, so he was in the clear. Mine had been pale enough for concern, but now that an uncomfortable pins and needles feeling was creeping into them, I knew I’d gotten off lucky for how long they’d been cold and wet.

Junior’s cell rang as we neared the exit for the warehouse district. He held up a finger to everyone in the car and brought the phone to his ear. “What?” A crease appeared between his brows as he listened to whatever the person on the other end of the line said. “And they’re cooperating?” Several moments passed before he nodded and spoke again. “Got it.”

He pulled the phone down and turned to look between Josh and me. “The cops found the bodies.”

My breath whooshed out in a rush of relief. “Oh, thank god.”

“Brad’s mom fainted when they told her,” Junior continued. “His dad gave the cops free rein of the house. Apparently, they didn’t realize what a sadistic little shit their son truly was.”

Josh nodded beside me. “I figured that when they didn’t recognize the smell of the bodies. They thought the housekeeper had forgotten to take the trash out.”

Junior’s gaze sharpened on him. “And how did you recognize it?”

Josh opened his mouth, but I cut him off. “None of your business. And what do you mean, his parents didn’t know? They were in that house going after Brad’s computer.”

Reluctantly, Junior pulled his eyes from my boyfriend and resettled them on me. “They claimed they were trying to find him. Their assumption is that he left the area after the arrest warrant was approved.”

I leaned back in my seat. “That’s good for us, right?”

Junior nodded. “We might not have found his phone, but one of our guys snagged his wallet. We’re going to have someone about his height and build use his debit card up north near the border to make it look like he fled into Canada. That should keep the cops and his family busy for a while.”

Josh and I shared a relieved look. This felt like a best-case scenario. Brad’s crimes were about to come to light. His family didn’t seem likely to impede an investigation into them. The cops were going to think that he’d fled the country, which meant they wouldn’t have any reason to look for a body.

Holy shit. Were we actually going to get away with what we’d done? It felt like we might, but I didn’t want to jinx myself by thinking about it too much.

Instead, I sidled closer to Josh while my cousin turned back around in his seat and continued his phone call. Josh wrapped an arm around my shoulders and resettled his blanket so we were both covered by it. He leaned down and nuzzled his nose into my hair just above my ear. I closed my eyes and was starting to relax when he spoke, low enough so only I would hear his words.

“That’s twice now that you’ve broken a promise to me, Aly. I hope you can handle the consequences.”

My eyes flashed wide. Shit. I’d told him I’d stay behind and failed to keep my word. Again. But in my defense, there were extenuating circumstances in both situations. He had to realize that, right?

I wanted to mention it, plead my case, but this wasn’t the time. Josh was a rational guy – for the most part. Maybe I could convince him to see reason once I got him alone. Anyone in my place would have done the same. Most importantly, he would have, but I could already hear his counterpoint of, “Yeah, but then I wouldn’t have promised to stay put in the first place.”

You think I would have learned after the first breach of trust, but nooo, I just had to do it a second time. Honestly, I couldn’t even blame Josh for being angry about that. Trust was the foundation of any good relationship, and I’d drilled holes in ours right after it had been laid. Maybe I could find some way to make it better by apologizing. By telling him I wouldn’t do it again.

But, god help me, a large part of me was too excited by the idea of him punishing me to say anything. Unlike me, he’d done nothing to break my trust so far, and I had a feeling that anything he doled out would be as pleasurable as it was torturous.

The next twenty minutes passed in a blur as I dreamt up all the sinful ways my boyfriend could correct my bad behavior. I had visions of whips and chains, hand necklaces and nipple clamps. Before Josh, my sex life had been the epitome of vanilla, but between social media, the salacious books I’d read, and the kink-specific porn I’d watched, it was easy to imagine all the delicious punishments in my future, and thinking about them was much better than thinking of the night we’d just had.

I must not have been the only one lost to their thoughts because the drive back to the warehouse passed in near silence. As soon as we pulled up to the rear of the building where we’d started the night, Josh told me to stay put and then slipped out of the SUV to preheat his car so I wouldn’t get cold again. On the surface, the gesture was sweet as hell, but there was a wolfish gleam in his eyes when he looked at me that made me feel like I was being hunted.

“Hey,” Junior said.

I turned from watching Josh’s shadowy form stride through the night and looked at my cousin. Judging by Junior’s expression, he’d been trying to get my attention for a while. “Yeah?”

“You remember what to do if the cops ever show up asking questions?”

“Tell them I don’t know anything,” I said.

“And if they keep asking?”

“Demand to speak to a lawyer.”

Junior nodded. “Good. I’ll have our guy call you tomorrow so you know who’s representing you.”

“Thank you for everything,” I said. After all, if not for my family’s help, Josh and I probably would have gotten caught. When I thought about it that way, having dinner with them once a month felt like a small price to pay.

Junior shrugged. “You’re family. It’s what we do.”

Was it really so uncomplicated to him? “Still, thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” he said, starting to look uncomfortable. He glanced out his window at Josh’s idling car. “How’d he know what a dead body smells like?”

Josh’s story wasn’t mine to tell, but this was Junior’s second time asking the question, and I had a feeling that if I didn’t tell him something, he’d start digging into my boyfriend’s past. I’d do whatever I could to avoid that, for both mine and Josh’s sakes.

Lying wasn’t my forte, but I gave it my best shot. “He found a deer rotting in the woods when he was a kid, and it traumatized him. Said he’d never forget the smell.”

Junior grimaced. “I bet.”

“How’d your men recognize it?” I asked, hoping to turn the tables.

He met my gaze head-on, looking more like his father than ever. “How do you think?”

It was my turn to grimace. No wonder my hackles had risen the second I laid eyes on them. At first, staying behind in the van seemed like the easiest thing in the world because it meant I’d be able to put so much space between me and the dead-eyed crew of ex-soldiers.

I’d been equally happy to stay behind with Josh after they’d aborted their mission, deciding I’d rather risk my boyfriend’s wrath than be trapped in a van with them. Now, watching Josh get out of his car and stalk toward my door, I wondered why I’d made that decision. Junior would have been with me if I’d stayed put, and I didn’t doubt that he would shoot anyone who made a move for me. Had I stayed behind because, subconsciously, part of me hoped to add to my punishment? Or was it just that I couldn’t bear the thought of abandoning my boyfriend?

I shook my head to clear it. Maybe my subconscious played a small part, but more than anything, my reaction had been knee-jerk. Josh was staying behind, so I would, too. End of discussion. I would have never forgiven myself if I’d left him and something happened. And deep down, part of me wondered if leaving him had been the plan all along. After all, Josh was responsible for Brad’s death. If not for the basement bodies, would the team have found another excuse to bail prematurely and leave him to fend for himself and hopefully get caught?

The thought made me shudder. If I hadn’t gotten out of the van when I had, would my cousin have ordered us to drive to the pickup spot? Or would he have tried to overpower me and leave Josh behind?

Maybe I was being paranoid or mean-spirited by thinking such things about my relatives, but my gut was telling me that I was onto something, and so far, it hadn’t led me astray. I might have softened some toward my mobster family members, but I would never trust them, especially not with my boyfriend’s welfare, which would likely make our upcoming dinners about as fun as running through the woods at night during winter.

Josh opened my door, pulling me from my dark thoughts. His gaze bored into mine, the anemic glow of the distant floodlights painting his face half in light, half in shadow, reminding me of his mask. “Ready?”

I nodded and held my arms out. One look at Josh was enough for me to realize that no matter the consequences or reasons behind my actions, I wouldn’t change my decision to stay with him. Our fates were twined together, for better or for worse.

He reached in and scooped me out of the backseat, blankets and all, and I wrapped my arms around his neck and held on tight. “Thanks, Junior,” he called into the cabin.

“You owe us one,” my cousin called back.

Josh nodded. “You know how to find me.”

With that, he turned and strode toward his car, shuffling me when we reached it so he could open my door and settle me into the seat. He even went so far as to move it forward so my feet were closer to the heater. Ducking down, he tucked the blanket tight around me. “You good? Comfy?”

“I’d be a lot more comfortable if you told me what I’m in for,” I said.

His flash of teeth looked feral in the moonlight. I didn’t think it was a good thing that he didn’t answer me, instead shutting my door and going around to his, but the way he limped made me wonder if he was in any condition to be doling out punishment.

The nurse in me took over as he dropped into the driver’s seat. “Regardless of what you have planned for me, I want to look at your ribs when we get home. Don’t think I missed the way you’ve been wheezing.”

He sent me a saucy wink. “You just want an excuse to get me topless.”

“Always,” I shot back. “But seriously, did you hit your ribs?”

He put the car in drive and eased out of the parking spot. “You just steal my breath away, Aly.”

I nearly groaned. That wasn’t a no. “Josh, if you carried me with a cracked rib, I’m going to punish you right back.”

A wicked grin split his face, and I knew from the mischievous gleam in his eyes what was coming next. “Kin-”

I clapped a hand over his mouth.

He swirled his tongue over my palm, all the warning I had before he bit down. Hard.

I yelped and pulled my hand back.

“Ky,” he finished.