Return to Her by Alexandra O'Hurley

Chapter One
     
    Mason Parker unlocked his
front door, the woman behind him a random victim of his Southern
charm and lust. She was beautiful, but there was something missing.
He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but whatever it was, it was lacking.
As soon as he pushed the door open, he knew he was making a
mistake.
    When had he grown a conscience over
bedding women?
    Damn it, it’s all Cassie’s
fault. His roommate’s girlfriend had been
letting her feelings on the subject be known for quite some time
now. Of course, most of her other advice had been spot on, so why
wouldn’t she be right about this? Don’t
you want something more than one nighters and casual
relationships? He could hear her voice
asking the question in his head as he looked over his shoulder at
the evening’s new one nighter.
    Yeah. He did. Someday.
    Just not now. He was young
and supposed to be having fun, right? Cassie’s voice came to mind
again. Do you really enjoy a different
woman every month? That’s got to get boring. Mason looked over his shoulder one more time. The woman
behind him was pretty enough, but he’d barely spoken to her at the
club, the music had been too loud. It had been a purely physical
thing and he had no idea if there was a brain in that pretty head.
She’d been fairly quiet on the ride over, answering his questions
with one or two word answers. Boring.
    Why was he letting Cassie twist him up
like this? If she hadn’t started this whole line of questioning
this morning, he’d have no problem continuing on the path of least
resistance.
    When he finally did settle
down, he’d find someone special, with all the depth the girls he’d
been dating didn’t have. He’d find someone who saw the man he was inside,
someone he could talk with about anything—a woman who wasn’t boring
and he could see himself growing old with. Someone like…
    A face came to view and he
pushed it away. That face had a boyfriend, one she seemed happy
enough with, which Mason didn’t understand at all . Mason wasn’t the kind to
poach another man’s girlfriend, no matter how wonderfully perfect
she was or how undeserving her boyfriend.
    He opened the door and
flipped on a switch as he turned to urge the woman inside. Mason
frowned for a moment. Heather? That was
her name, right?
    “ Come on in,” he said,
leaving her name off his lips.
    Heather, or whatever her name was,
frowned as she glanced inside his place. “Have you been robbed or
does it always look like this?”
    Mason whipped his head around and
looked into his apartment. The place was trashed, with drawers
askew, his CDs knocked over, and books scattered everywhere. He
turned to Heather. “Go over by the car and let me check the place
out.”
    “ Shouldn’t you call the
cops,” Heather asked. “It’s chilly out here.”
    “ Just go by the car where
it’s safe,” he said, rushing through the door. It looked as though
someone had been searching for something, but what? Reaching for a
baseball bat beside the open closet door, Mason lifted it and
peered inside. After ensuring it was empty, he passed the kitchen,
which was also clear, and then opened the bathroom door. The
medicine cabinet was open and items were strewn about the counter.
Mason checked every room, one by one. Mason’s room had been
untouched. Weird. He finally ended with Dave’s bedroom.
    It was completely bare—the furniture,
the clothes, everything gone.
    Except for an envelope taped to the
end of the ceiling fan’s pull cord. Mason took it down and opened
it, wondering what the fuck was going on.
    Mason –
    Sorry dude, but I had to
bail. Things were getting a little too crazy for me. I’m leaving
town, so I guess this is goodbye. If I can send you money, I
will.
    – Dave
    Mason stared at the note another
moment, as if more meaning would be wrung from it if he looked a
while longer. Dave was officially two months behind on rent as of
that morning and had been promising to pay up for days.