Arrogant Playboy(66)
The awkward, shy Annelise I met weeks ago is dead and gone. This psychotic woman is officially leading the charge.
“I’m not going to discuss him with you anymore,” I push past her, heading for the cash registers. My gut tells me not to engage with crazy.
The clicking of her heels match my strides as she follows me. A cold sweat trails down the back of my neck. This woman is completely obsessed with Beckham on a much larger scale than I previously assumed.
“He’s a monster,” she calls after me. “I created him, and only I know how to love him.”
My lips tighten and my skin flushes.
I don’t want to respond, but I won’t sit back and let some crazy stalker woman slander a man who doesn’t get enough credit for the good things he does.
But when I turn to silence her, she’s gone.
Chapter Thirty-Five
BECKHAM
“Here you go.” Odessa places a white plastic sack on my desk Monday morning.
Examining the kit, I read the fine print on the back as she stands before me, fidgeting.
“If you go online, you can pay a fee and upgrade to a rush order,” she says. “Just a quick swab of both your mouths, mail it off, pay the fee, and you should have your answer in less than two weeks.”
“Thank you.” I put the box back in the sack and slip my hands in my pockets, eyes dragging the length of her and catching a small twitch in her fingers. “What’s all this?”
“Pardon?”
“You’re shaking.” I hope to God she’s not being all jittery because we fucked last night and she decided all of a sudden to develop fucking feelings for me.
“I ran into Annelise last night,” she says. “For the third time in three weeks.”
My brows furrow. The name isn’t ringing a bell. “Annelise?”
“Yes.” She puts force into the word, as if that would help me to remember. “Annelise. Your Annelise.”
I chuckle. “I don’t have an Annelise.”
Odessa glances to the left, scratching the corner of her mouth. “She sure knows you. She knows where you work. Where you live. She knew my name two weeks ago. Said you’d told her about me.”
My brows rise. “I haven’t told anyone about you.”
Besides Xavier, but I’m not telling her that. She’ll think I like her or some shit.
I sink down in my chair, resting my chin in my hand. The lack of sleep lately hasn’t done much for my short-term memory. I mentioned Odessa to Xavier a couple weeks ago, but he doesn’t know any Annelieses that I’m aware of. Pretty sure the girl he went home with that night was named Hayley or Heather or Harper.
“She came in here my first day, brought you lunch but you’d left,” she says.
“She came in here?” I lean forward.
“Okay, now you’re freaking me out.” Odessa slumps into a guest chair. “She came in here looking for you. And then I bumped into her the next week when I went out to get coffee. She cried when I told her she needed to get over you.”
“Whoa, whoa.” I lift my hand. “I have no clue who you’re fucking talking about. Some woman walked in here, bringing me lunch, and then you talked to her about me and she cried?”
This is some Eva-level shit.
“Yeah,” she says, eyes wide. “And I ran into her last night, at the pharmacy. She saw me buying the kit.”
My hands rake the sides of my head, nails digging into my scalp.
“What does she look like?” I ask, my heart thundering as my suspicion grows.
Odessa winces, glancing up at the ceiling. “She’s pretty. Short blonde hair. Platinum. Big blue eyes. Lots of makeup. Well-dressed. The second time I saw her, she was wearing this diamond lotus pendant on her collar.”
“Mother fucker.”
“What?” Odessa’s hand flies to her chest. “Who is she, Beck?”
“Her name isn’t Annelise.” My teeth grind, and I swallow the ball in my throat. “It’s Sophie Glass, my ex-fiancé.”
“This woman is obsessed with you.” Her hands tremble in her lap. “She called you a monster. Followed me around the pharmacy. I thought maybe she was some one-night stand who took things too far. You’d mentioned you’d had stalkers before.”
“Yeah.” I huff.
“She said she knew the baby wasn’t yours.”
My lips rub together, and I grab the stress ball next to my monitor, clenching it in my fist until it’s reduced to nothing. A minute later, I stand.
“Where are you going?” She grips the arms of her chair, pushing herself up.
I don’t answer. Anger fills my head, preventing me from speaking even if I wanted to. It’s one thing to follow me around. It’s another thing to stalk my female employees.