Page 40 of Stalked By the Third Baseman

“Yours? Yeah.” He let go of my hand and bent down, only to pull out what looked like a box.

A box filled with things.

Familiar-looking things.

My things. Things that had gone missing over the last year.

“What… what… I don’t⁠—“

“I told you, warned you about how deep this went for me. The stalking? Following you around?” he asked and I nodded. “That was just the tip of the iceberg.” He leaned forward, and I fell back on the bed.

Adam’s body hovered over mine, and my breathing changed. Suddenly, I was very aware of just how close he was. How his body heat radiated against my skin and just how little I was wearing.

“I took those panties the night before I saw that asshole talking to you at the bench, before Rox showed up.”

“What? How?” A predatory gleam washed through his stare before he slowly brushed my hair away from my face, carefully tucking it behind my ear. “While you were tucked in and sound asleep in bed.”

“What?” I swallowed. Visions of Adam in my room, hiding and lurking around in the dark while I slept, filled my head.

Again, my traitorous, seriously sick body and mind didn’t try to fight him off. Didn’t bother to try and push him away to give me space. If anything, my heart started to pick up speed and warm wetness started to coat my thighs. Like hearing the fact he’d snuck into my apartment while I was sleeping and stole things from me was a romantic love letter instead of a serious breach of my privacy.

“It took me a month.” He broke the silence that had fallen between us.

“A month?” I whispered, my voice unrecognizable.

“A month of us not talking. Of you turning around and heading in the other direction any time you saw me on campus. I thought…” He shook his head. “I used the key I copied.”

“I never gave you a key,” I pointed out, shocked at how steady and calm I sounded.

“I know.” His eyes darkened. “I took it. To be fair, it was Roxie’s key. She didn’t know.”

“Adam—“

“I snuck into your place. Just stood at the door of your room. Watching you breathe was enough for me. I’d felt like I was suffocating not being close to you, and that first time I snuck in after a month of not being able to take a full breath, I was at peace. Until you shifted in bed and I was scared out of my mind you’d wake up and see me there. Watching you.”

“Adam—“

“So, I forced myself to leave. But after that first time, I never lasted longer than a week. Sometimes not even that. And every time I visited you, watched you sleep, I moved closer and closer. And I don’t regret it. I can’t.” He shook his head. The intensity in his gaze, the emotions reflecting back at me, left me almost a puddle underneath him. “It’s what got me through the year.” Shit, why was that twistedly sweet?

“You would watch me sleep?” I whispered, and he nodded. “You took my panties?”

“Yeah,” he rasped. “And in the name of being honest, I came home and jerked off into them over and over after smelling you. Jesus, Callie, if you knew what kinds of depraved things I thought about, you would kick me in the balls right now and get the hell away from me.”

“But if I ran, you would chase me, wouldn’t you?” A muscle at his jaw twitched. “You would chase me and catch me.” I wasn’t sure why, but I was poking a bear.

“Fuck, yes, I would.” He groaned, pressing his forehead against mine. “Tell me this doesn’t change anything between us.”

“Oh, it definitely changed things between us,” I half-whispered, half-moaned, and I felt his body lock up over mine.

“Callie. Shit. Holy fuck, this get my ladybug horny?”

“Everything you do makes me horny, Adam.”

“You’re not mad?” I shook my head.

“I should be but…” I hesitated. “Was this all of it?”

“Yes.” He nodded.