“What did it say?” Kellie asks, and Cori looks down at her hands and then looks up with tears in her eyes.
“It said I wish I could sit with you and watch the sun.” The minute she says that, Kellie gasps, then looks at Tommy.
“Like in the picture he took of me,” she tells him, her voice going higher and higher. “In the mornings, I walk outside with coffee and sit on the big couch to watch the valley as the sun rises.” She looks at them now. “Why didn’t anyone fucking tell me? I would have stopped.” She gets up, walking out of the room, and Cori follows her out.
“We had it,” Tommy starts, and then Hunter finally says something.
“You had shit,” Hunter finally says. “You hired two robo cops to watch her, and they fell asleep twice.” He raises his hand and motions with his fingers. “In five days. And in that time, the guy came into her house.” Hunter looks at her. “I can sugarcoat this, or we can just chalk it up to it wasn’t good.”
“Now you think I’m over the top?” I ask Tommy. “That sick fuck was in her house. In her fucking bedroom.” Sitting up more, I hiss out the last sentence. “When the fuck were you going to finally take this seriously, Tommy? You hire two imbeciles who can’t even stay awake. Then you don’t even get someone to shadow her.” I shake my head. “You should have called us right away.”
He nods and puts his hands up. “It’s not the first time she’s had stalkers.” He looks at us. “And it won’t be the last. Do you know how many sickos we block on social media? Tons.”
“Did the last stalkers get this close? You know, in her fucking house?” I shout out the last words. “Bottom line, you should have fucking called us.”
“Well, you clearly found out,” Tommy says. “I need help, guys.” He looks at us. “We had all the letters tested and got nothing. Not even a fingerprint.”
“If we help you,” Hunter starts, “you let us take over.” He waits for Tommy to say something, but he just nods. “You let Brian take over everything that has to do with her on the road. If he says jump, she fucking jumps.”
“Fine,” a soft voice says, and our heads swing to the archway where Kellie stands with Cori by her side. She walks in, and when I see that her eyes are red, I know she’s been crying. “I’ll listen to whatever Brian tells me.” Tommy gets up and goes to her, bringing her into his arms. She wraps her arms around his waist as he whispers something in her ear. She just nods at him and then sits at the table.
“Now that I know everything”—her voice is as strong as it could be—“I want to go over all the plans.” She doesn’t look at me, not once. Her head stays down as she takes the booklet I made, and then I lean back in the seat and let Hunter do all the talking. When we leave five hours later, my body feels like it’s going to explode. This whole day has been one test after another. I wanted to throat punch Tommy for being so stupid, then I wanted to shake or hug or just protect Kellie. It was up and down the whole time. Every single time I thought about this asshole in her house, I wanted to hit something. Then I would catch her shaking her foot because she was nervous, and I wanted to reach out and hold her and tell her that everything was going to be okay.
“You need to reel that shit in,” Hunter finally says when we get in the car, and he drives out of the driveway. I look in my passenger side mirror, watching the gate close behind us.
“I swear sometimes I want to kick his ass,” I finally say. “To not even tell her.” I shake my head.
“Doesn’t matter,” he says. “She knows now, and from the look on her face, she isn’t going to be a problem.”
We don’t say anything the rest of the drive home, and when I get to the gym two hours later, I let all my frustrations out. I end up collapsing on the bed when I get home.
Two days later, I’m in the middle of my living room when the doorbell rings. Tossing the remote onto the couch, I get up and walk to the door. I just got out of the shower, so my hair is still wet, and all that I have on are my shorts. Unlocking the door, I pull it open, and my mouth falls open when I see who is standing there.
“Hi,” Kellie says, and I look her up and down. She is wearing black yoga pants and a loose black and white striped top with a pink jacket. A faded blue Yankees cap sits on her head, and she’s braided her blond hair on both sides. “Sorry for showing up unannounced.”
Shaking my head and trying to get a hold of myself, I move out of the way to let her come in. “Please, come in.” When she enters, I look outside and don’t see anyone with her. “Did you come here by yourself?”
“Yeah, I just finished packing, and I borrowed Cori’s car so people wouldn’t follow me,” she says and steps into the living room since it’s right inside the front door.
I’ve lived in this house for five years, and it’s only me, so my house is small. Plus, a bigger house means more cleaning, and no one has time for that. I mean, not that I actually clean my house, but if I did, I wouldn’t want to clean a big house. “Can I get you something to drink?” I ask her. Walking to the oversized gray couch, I grab the remote and turn off the television.
“A water would be good. Thank you,” she says, putting her oversized bag on the floor beside the door and following me to the kitchen. I didn’t know what type of house I wanted when I started looking, but the minute I saw the open floor plan, I knew it was what I wanted. Walking to the fridge, I open it and grab her a water bottle. When I turn around, I see her pulling out one of the stools from around the island. I hand her the water bottle. “Thank you.”
“What are you doing here?” Finally, the question comes out.
“I thought with us leaving tomorrow, it would be best if we talked a bit.” Her hands go to the label around the water bottle, her eyes going down and then coming back up again to look at me.
“I thought we went over this already,” I say, standing up straight now with my arms crossed over my chest. “And you agreed.”
She holds up one hand. “Calm down. I wanted to talk about the elephant in the room.” She smiles and then looks down. “You know, when I flirted with you.” I don’t say anything because I don’t know what to say to that. “Anyway, this is super awkward for me, so thanks for making it even more awkward by standing there not saying anything.”
“What do you want me to say, Kellie?” I ask her. “What exactly is there for me to say?” She lets out a breath and starts.
“I flirted with you, and you did nothing about it,” she says, “so I just want to maybe forget that happened and move on.”
“You mean you flirted with me while you were dating someone else and expected me to jump on it?” I ask, cocking my head to the side.
“That is so not what happened!” she shrieks. “I was barely dating him, and by the end, I was definitely not dating him.”
I swallow down and calm my nerves when I say, “So you’re telling me that you hired me to bring you to your boyfriend’s house, but he really wasn’t your boyfriend?”
“Oh my God,” she says, throwing her hands up and looking up at the sky. “Listen, can we just forget it happened?”