Unmissing(45)

There are days when the entire thing is shrouded in a dreamlike haze, days when I find myself wondering if any part of those first few months was real. They say first loves are intense, that they can hook their horns in parts of your heart you never knew existed and make you blind to reality. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t fantasize about our exquisite early years, missing them with confusing intensity.

The Luca I knew from our diner days was quiet and docile. Always kept to himself. Stealing looks and gifting the occasional smile in passing until he finally worked up the nerve to approach me during a break one slow Thursday afternoon. With little finesse and a load of awkwardness, he asked if I wanted to catch a movie with him that weekend.

At first I told him no. Politely, of course. But the crestfallen look on his face haunted me for days, snapping my heart in two every time I thought about it.

I convinced myself I did the right thing.

He wasn’t my type—not that I dated much. I was freshly twenty and had better things to do than find some local boy to chain myself to. But I tended to go for the louder guys, the ones who weren’t afraid to make their presence known, who weren’t satisfied with blending into the wallpaper. The ones who cracked witty one-liners, worked on cars, and repeated movie lines with impressive accuracy.

There was a darkness about Luca, an intensity I couldn’t ignore. Some days I felt sorry for the guy, knowing full well what it’s like to be an outsider myself. Other times I couldn’t shake the frigid blast that blanketed the room in his presence. Even his stare would make me lose my train of thought sometimes.

I shamed myself for being dramatic, for viewing him the same way everyone else did.

I convinced myself he was simply misunderstood.

A misfit like me.

As time went on, any time the kitchen staff poked fun at him behind his back, I didn’t hesitate to defend him. Everything about him screamed bully material, and I’ve always had a soft spot for the underdog.

It wasn’t until a month later—on a rainy night when I hitched a ride home with him and we ended up driving around town for two hours—that we really got to talk. It was almost like being with an old friend.

Turned out all he needed was to be on his own turf. Seated comfortably behind the wheel of his car, he waxed on about fascinating conspiracy theories, classic literary fiction, cryptocurrency, AI, and the dark web. All this time I had thought he was void of personality, but all it took was a little change of scenery and the real Luca had a chance to shine.

I like your brain, I told him when he dropped me off later that night. It’s different.

We sat in his idling car and he laughed, telling me it was a weird thing to say to someone but he’d accept the compliment anyway. I let him take me to that movie the following weekend. We were inseparable after that.

“He had me legally declared dead,” I say, breaking our silence. “A couple years after I went missing.”

Delphine chuffs. “Why would he do that?”

“Impossible to know.” I lift a shoulder. “I only have theories.”

Every twisted move Luca made was an exercise in power and control. I eventually learned—after endless hours of letting him yammer on about himself—that his parents were hyperzealous control freaks who held him to impossible OCD standards and rigid, militaristic schedules. The other day Merritt described them as alcoholic and narcissistic. And maybe that’s the way he portrayed them to her. Either way, there’s no denying Luca’s the progeny of two unstable people, and I was the vessel for his rebellion—as were his messy mane, unkemptness, and penchant for torturing the helpless.

He told me stories of trapping small neighborhood animals—usually raccoons or opossums—throwing them in garbage cans, and dousing them in lighter fluid before tossing in a match and watching them burn. He also told me he stole a friend’s pet rat once. Experimented on it for a week before it finally died. I’d give anything to scrub those gory details from my brain, but I’m pretty sure they’re permanently embossed in my gray matter.

I don’t care how successful or happily married that man is now, there’s no getting around his sickness. It’s rooted to his core, a living, breathing wickedness that resides deep in his marrow. There’s no fixing him, no saving him, and there’s certainly no redeeming him.

While I came here to reclaim my life, I also came back to beat him at his own game, to show him he no longer has an ounce of control over me.

I’m in control now.

His life is in my hands.

I could ruin him—and I intend to—but only after I draw this out a little longer, make him squirm, bleed his bank accounts dry, and send his wife and children far from his grasp.

He doesn’t deserve them.

Delphine rests her chin on her hand, gaze focused on me. Maybe she’s replaying our initial meeting in her head, going over all the things I did and didn’t divulge.

“How’d you get away?” She frowns.

“I didn’t get away so much as I got lucky.” Luck has never been a friend of mine, but there’s a first time for everything. “One day last summer he showed up, put a cloth sack over my head, and marched me into the woods with a gun shoved into my back. The bastard shot me and left me to die.”

“How’d you survive that?” Her mouth is agape.

“He shot me in the shoulder—left side. I think he meant for it to go through my heart, but it missed. Went out the other side. I bled out . . . enough for him to probably think it was a fatal blow. As soon as he was gone, I wrapped my shirt around the wound and sprinted for the nearest clearing. Ended up at some hunter’s cabin, where I was able to clean myself up. Cleared out all the man’s canned goods when I was done. Ate until I was sick.”