Free Sticky by Julia Swift

of assholes like me—my chest clenches even tighter.
    I ignore the rest of the room, feeling like if I have to watch this place, the least I can do is give Sloan’s personal possessions some privacy, and I make a beeline for the kitchen. Planting the camera there is easy—it blends in with the exhaust fan above her stove, which is clearly out-of-order and probably hasn’t been turned on in a decade.
    In her bedroom, I have another flash, this time seeing the two of us sprawled across this queen-size bed, sliding across the white satin sheets she has spread on it, visible because the comforter is crumpled on the floor. She’s got what looks like half her wardrobe piled on a chair in the corner or scattered across the bed, and somehow the mess makes me like her better, because real women let their hair down and their apartments go messy sometimes.
    I can picture my head between her legs as she straddles that office chair. I can see her lying spread-eagle on the bed, hands and ankles bound at the corners, bared for me to savor. I can see her kneeling beside the bed, sucking me into that perfect mouth of hers while I grip the headboard with white knuckles.
    I ignore the raging hard-on I’ve got going on and knock a few clothes off the chair, dragging it over to the top of the closet where a small crack in the wall (water damage, thanks a lot landlord) gives me just enough space to wedge in the final camera.
    My stomach churns. I have never felt this way during a job before.
    I’ve hated myself, yes. Thought the worst of me. Known I’m doomed to a shitty future because of all the fucked up jobs I’ve pulled for Aaron in the past. I’ve always known that if I’m ever caught doing one of these jobs, if I’m ever arrested or shot or worse, I’ll deserve every ounce of pain and punishment I get.
    But I’ve never felt bad about the people I’ve had to target before. They’ve always been people like Fred Casey. Gamblers, addicts, losers, con artists. Men like Aaron himself, or women like the hookers he hires to suck him off.
    Never a woman like this. Never a person like Sloan.
    Fucking hell. I creep out of the apartment again, depositing the final piece to this elaborate puzzle into her mailbox as I leave, making sure to lock the door behind me as I go.
    I keep worrying that she’ll find out what I’m doing. That she’ll learn how I’ve betrayed her, how I’ve been betraying her since before we even met. I worry about how I’ll never be able to make it work if she discovers this secret, if she learns the kind of work I’ve done for Aaron in the past, the things I’m still doing for him now, and to her, of all people.
    But maybe that’s the problem. I don’t deserve a happily ever after.
    I don’t deserve her forgiveness.

Chapter Fourteen

Sloan
    R ain-check on movie night ? I text Freddie as I leave the diner. Tonight’s my early shift, over by ten. We have time to catch a midnight showing of something if we hurry, though it won’t be at the Tuesday prices, so maybe he won’t be interested. Or we could just watch a rerun at my place or something, I add, in case money’s the reason he was angsting the other day.
    Guilt settles into my veins. Something was bugging Freddie days ago, and I’ve barely spoken to him at all since then, except to answer his How’d the date go? text with a smiley face, which prompted a Gross, I’m your brother, TMI reply.
    I’ve been so caught up in Gage—in the emotions he brings out of me, and in my newfound fear that I’ll never experience those again, that he won’t want to see me again—that I didn’t even think about my sibling.
    I spend the whole drive home from the diner forcing thoughts of Gage out and ideas to cheer up Freddie in. Maybe we can order pizza from his favorite spot tonight and watch that shitty zombie remake movie he’s been bugging me to watch since last year, which I refused to see on principle because the original version was so good.
    I’m