Page 51 of He Followed Me First

He’s gone, and the house is too quiet.

Talia’s here, but she barely speaks to me. She’s either glued to her phone or barking commands down the line at someone I’ll never see. She’s presence without presence. White noise in combat boots.

I can handle one night.

I think.

Knowing Cam’s out there—risking everything, trading masks, charm and fury just to chase justice for me—folds my chest in on itself.

He says it’s about more than just me now, and I believe him.

We’ve both got skin in the game.

Flesh.

Blood.

Scar tissue.

And the longer I sit here, in this pristine shell of a house, the more that anger churns, festering under my skin—starting with my uncle, ending with the bastard who took Lea.

I’ve imagined all their deaths.

Replayed the endings over and over, fifty thousand times in my head—each one sharper than the last.

It helps. More than therapy ever could.

And knowing Cam thinks the same way? That he sees what I see when he closes his eyes? That just confirms what I’ve known since the moment he pulled me out—I belong to him, and he belongs to me. No fairy tales. Just fire and loyalty and vengeance.

But I’m not going to be the girl who waits in the dark while the war rages. Not anymore.

Tonight, I train.

I’ve watched Cam in the gym more times than I care to admit—creeping on him like some lovesick shadow. Sparring with Talia. Slamming fists into that body opponent bag shaped like a man. Each hit precise, vicious, deliberate.

I can do that.

I will do that.

Because I’m done being helpless.

I knot my hair into a barely passable bun—more feral than sexy—and crack my neck like I know what I’m doing. I don’t. But confidence counts, right?

The first few rounds with the body opponent bag are a disaster. Full-on humiliation. I ricochet off it and land on my ass more than once, and at one point, the freestanding brute rebounds so hard it clocks me square in the nose. Rude. But I don’t quit. I’ve never been the type to tap out after a couple of bruises.

I roll to my feet, shake it off, and go again. Each attempt teaches me something—how to duck, how to block, how not to get annihilated by rubberised vengeance.

By the time I nail a basic kick and defence combo, I’m drenched. Drenched in the kind of sweat that clings like betrayal and leaves no survivors. Not cute. Definitely not hot.

Cam looks like a damn Greek statue when he trains—glowing skin, carved muscles, all cinematic perfection. Me? I resemble a radioactive shrimp trying to learn choreography. Right arm, left foot—everything’s a tangle of limbs.

Discombobulated, yes.

But determined? That, I’ve got in spades.

Every time I go back, it’s someone new I’m punishing.

Someone whose hands took too much.

Someone whose smile twisted into something monstrous.

And then it shifts.

Suddenly, it’s his face staring back at me—the one I’ve tried to erase from memory but never could. My uncle. Those heavy-lidded eyes that always looked past me like I was a thing, not a child. The nicotine-stained lips, always puckered around a cigarette. The greying chest hair that used to sprout from his shirts and make my stomach turn.

A walking nightmare wrapped in a family name.

Not today.

Today, I don’t stop.

My fists fly. My foot lands. My body moves with a violence I’ve never allowed myself to feel—not like this. Each strike is controlled and savage. I hit until the sounds of flesh meeting vinyl blur into rhythm. Until the dummy sags at the chest, the synthetic skin misshapen and bruised.

And I don’t stop then, either.

Because this isn’t just training.

This is reckoning.

Stupid me forgot a towel—classic—so I pad barefoot down the hallway, sticky with sweat, trying to keep my steps quiet as I pass the office. The last thing I want is a conversation with Talia. She talks like a drill sergeant, types like thunder, and barely acknowledges I exist unless I’m in her way.

But then I hear it—

A name.

Kyla.

My stomach drops.

It’s not jealousy, not really. I’m not some vindictive girl hoping his wife stays lost just so I have a shot. It’s fear. Because if they’ve picked up a trace of her, if she’s back in the game—it’s over. I lose Cam. For good.

I can’t compete with that.

With history. With vows. With the woman he spent years chasing through screens and leads.

I was never supposed to fall for him. But I did. Hard. And now? Now I’m just wreckage he carried out of a nightmare.

Too broken to be kept.

Too shattered to be loved.

“I’ll make sure he knows,”

Talia says, her voice clipped and sharp.

“If it’s the auction I think it is, we’re in for a shot.”

Her words pierce through me like blades.

Their auction. Their plan. Their world.

I laid everything bare for him today—every bruise, every scar, every twisted part of my history. Handed it to him like a weapon, like maybe he’d know what to do with it. But if he chooses her? I can’t be angry.

He married her for a reason. He chased her for a reason. And maybe I’m just the detour. The necessary heartbreak. The thank-you-for-your-service goodbye.

Like I needed another reason to hate myself for surviving the last auction.

What started out as a productive evening has quickly shifted south, and now the only thing I can do is pack up the remnants of my life and leave him to live his.

I can’t ask him to choose me over his wife.

And I won’t.

That kind of love—clean, timeless, chosen—isn’t mine to claim.

So, I’ll disappear.

Fade back into the nobody I used to be before he walked into my life. Or maybe before I crashed into his—whatever story you choose to tell.

And once I’m gone, once he has room to breathe and space to rediscover whatever he had with her, I’ll start rethinking everything. The living arrangements. My place in the world. All of it.

Let’s be honest—there’s not much left to salvage.

My job’s probably gone.

My best friend is missing.

And now that I’ve tasted the kind of love Cam could have given me—burning, brutal, and utterly beautiful—I know I’ll spend the rest of my life chasing something no one else can replicate.

I drop into autopilot.

The way I have so many times before.

Dragging out my battered suitcase and tossing my things into it like they don’t matter anymore.

Each item feels like a piece of me slipping away.

Boomerang watches from his new plush bed, unbothered, king of this dangerous kingdom. Shame I’ll have to pull him from it.

I reach for him gently, hoping for comfort, but he senses the storm inside me and bolts.

No purring. No soft lean. No loyalty.

Just one more reminder that even my cat won’t choose me now. Not after he’s seen what life could be like without the damage.

My life fits into one suitcase. Clothes, chargers, scraps of meaning folded between zips and tangled wires. Everything I am, packed without ceremony.

I still don’t know where I’ll go. Maybe back to my flat—if it still feels like mine. Maybe I’ll just vanish, find a quiet place far enough away that the ache inside me stops echoing. Somewhere I don’t have to pretend I’m okay. Somewhere final.

I drag the suitcase down each stair, wincing at every thump. I try to stay quiet, but grace was never my thing. The house is silent. Talia must have left. I glance behind me one last time—just one more moment to absorb the ghosts I’ll carry with me.

This was the only part of my life that held weight. The only chapter that felt real.

The quiet click of the front door lock seals it. That soft snap feels heavier than any goodbye I’ve ever known. But I can’t turn back. Cam deserves clarity. Space. I can’t complicate things for him—not more than I already have.

Boomerang will be happy here, away from my chaos. I can’t offer him the life he deserves. Besides, the uncertainty of my future right now is no place for a cat.

I’m alone again.

The shale bites beneath the suitcase wheels, refusing to roll, scraping like resistance. I don’t care. I drag it anyway.

And then I hear it—the low, unmistakable growl of a motorcycle engine. My heart stammers. Breath caught, pulse racing.

I shove harder against the weight in my hands. The gates feel impossibly far, and the suitcase is too damn heavy.

I can’t see his eyes behind the black helmet, but the tilt of his head says it all—he wasn’t expecting this. The bike slows to a rumbling standstill, one boot planted for balance. Then he flicks the visor up.

Those eyes—one dark, one pale—meet mine. The kind I was just starting to believe in.

“Where are you going?”

he calls out, voice raised over the low growl of the engine.

“I can’t do this, Cam. I need to go.”

“Can’t do what?”

I don’t answer. I can’t—not without crumbling. I drag the suitcase harder behind me, its weight fighting me every step. I just need to reach the path. Just need to get out of his orbit before I implode.

“Nell?”

The engine dies. He’s off the bike in seconds, helmet discarded, all leathers and heat and everything I’d convinced myself was worth falling for. He strides toward me with that stormy kind of purpose.

“You can’t just leave,”

he says.

“Where are you going? If this is about the pain thing—if you’re not ready—I swear, I can back off. We don’t have to go there. Not ever, if you—”

“I’m leaving because I won’t compete with your wife.”

That stops him.

But he doesn’t look surprised. Just quiet. Controlled, as always.

Talia’s already told him.

We stand locked in a stare-off. Neither of us backing down. My neck aches from craning so high to meet his gaze, but I refuse to be the first to blink.

“Who said you have to compete?”

he asks, voice steady, but there’s heat behind it. His words catch me off guard. They always do.

“She’s your wife, Cam,”

I say, fighting to sound grounded.

“We both know when she comes back, I’ll be nothing but a spare part. And I’m not the kind of girl who breaks up marriages.”

Not that I would be enough to break up his marriage anyway.

I move to push past him, dragging the suitcase like it doesn’t weigh a ton, but he doesn’t budge. He’s a solid wall of leather and restraint, planted right in the gateway with purpose.

He doesn’t answer right away. Just stares like he’s solving something unspeakable behind his eyes.

Then, without warning, he snatches the suitcase from my hand and tosses it aside like it’s nothing.

Before I can react, he dips his shoulder and scoops me up like I’m weightless, gripping the backs of my thighs with infuriating ease.

“Cam—what are you doing? Where are you taking me?”

“I’m going to show you exactly why you’re not second choice, Nell.”