“You fall asleep too,” I laugh.
“Yeah, because I’m nap-trapped by you,” he says. “I just accept my fate and go to sleep.”
“You’re so dramatic,” I say with a smile as I roll my eyes.
“I’m off for the rest of the day so let’s eat and go to your apartment,” he says.
We finish our lunch and talk about our day before we walk to the apartment building. We go to my apartment first and start gathering things to move. My clothes are easily packed away into suitcases. I have various other bags and I still have some boxes from when I moved in, so my personal effects are neatly placed together in the living room.
Dominic is refusing to let me pick anything up because I’m only two weeks out from my surgery, even though he cleared mehimself. He is in his apartment for a second and I am in my living room.
I hear someone come in the front door and I assume it is Dominic until it’s a completely different voice. I am looking in the boxes to make sure that I have all of my work stuff together. “Well hello,” I hear my old boss, Chase Miller, say.
I stand and spin to face him. “Why are you here?” I ask.
“They said you had surgery and you were working part-time for a few weeks,” he says as he walks a bit closer, shutting and locking the door behind him.
“I was moved out of your department because you are a fucking creep to me. You certainly shouldn’t be in my home,” I say.
“You know you got me written up for that?” he asks. Something in the way he is looking at me makes fear flood my veins. As he rounds the couch, I back up. I don’t want to be near him. I have avoided it for a while now. I thought I was rid of him since I switched managers right before my surgery. They said he wasn’t allowed to say anything to me, and I was blocked from his computer so he couldn’t see my stuff or contact me. How does he know where I live then?
“You need to leave,” I say firmly.
“You okay, Luna?” he asks. “You look scared.”
“Get out,” I say, pointing to the door. That was a mistake. I don’t realize it until he seizes my wrist and spins me so he can slam me against the wall.
“Sometimes a bitch needs to learn her place,” he growls in my ear as he presses his groin against my ass.
“Stop!” I manage to scream before he covers my mouth. He pulls me back from the wall before turning us toward the couch. My body finally lets me move and I start thrashing under his grip, trying to get free before he can get me on the couch.
I drop all of my weight suddenly and he loses his grip on me. I know I can’t run without him grabbing me again so I scream as loud as I can. “Dominic!”
It’s not even three seconds later he grabs me by the hair and drags me toward the couch. A few seconds later, I hear Dominic at the door. “Luna!” He calls out. Chase lets go of me immediately and runs for the fire escape.
Dominic gets the door open after a few kicks and I’ve already backed myself in a corner and slid down the wall to sit. “What happened? What’s wrong?”
“Ch-chase. He went to the fire escape,” I stutter. “He t-tried to… H-He was going to…”
“Shhh. You’re okay,” Dominic says as he scoops me up into his arms. He takes a few steps back before sitting on the couch with me in his lap. I bury my face and tears spill out of me. He holds me tightly and rubs my back until my breathing evens out and I calm down.
“Who is Chase?” he asks me.
“My old boss,” I say as I pull away and wipe my face. “A few days before the surgery, I went to his boss about him, making me feel uncomfortable over chat when he kept asking me out and then ended up sending me a message with a picture of his dick. He’s under contract so they can’t fire him and apparently, it’s not aviolation of his contract or whatever. They put someone else on and blocked him from seeing any of my information or contacting me. Apparently, he knew my address already. I was just looking in the boxes to make sure I had my work stuff, and he came in. He said that I got him written up… I told him to leave, but he wouldn’t. I told him to get out again and I pointed towards the door. He grabbed my wrist and slammed me against the wall.”
“What else?” he asks when I stop.
“I… I tried to scream at him to stop. He covered my mouth and then he was trying to move me towards the couch, I panicked. I managed to slip out and that’s when I screamed for you. He tried again to get me to the couch until he heard you at the door.”
“Are your cameras still working?” he asks, gesturing to the security camera, I have in the corner of the room. I nod and he cups my cheek. “Let’s stop for tonight and just go relax. We can pull the footage for what happened, and I’ll get it to the police to make a statement to them they should be able to pick him up if you have it on camera.
I pull my phone out of my pocket and go to the app. Once I’m there, I navigate through today’s activities. It takes me a second to fast-forward all the way to a few seconds before he walked in. Make sure that I’m screen recording so that I can get a copy of it.
Chase stood at the door and watched me for a solid 30 seconds before he ever stepped in. Dominic watches the video with me. You can hear the panic in my voice as I’m telling him to get out. I stopped at recording when Dominic scoops me up into his arms.”
“Come on,” he says softly. “Let’s go home.”
I nod and we stand to go to his apartment. Before we leave, Dominic goes through to make sure all the windows are locked. The window leading to the fire escape is wide open from where Chase rushed out.