“I do.” Blindly. Stupidly. With him, I find myself following my intuition with caution. “So your family? Are they okay?”
“Just a minor incident that needs to be cleaned up.”
“Cleared up, you mean?”
“No.” With his eyes on my face, he pulls me to the edge of the steps and against his lips. Once. Twice. His sweeps them back and forth before pausing. “Cleaned up is the right terminology in this instance. Someone has been hurt, and it’s up to me to clear their name and forcefully right this wrong.”
“Forcefully? Are you going to fight someone?”
“It would never be a fair fight.” Dropping his hands, Theo steps back and puts a bit of space between us. “Now, I’ll be out of the city limits, but Tero and Meera are only a phone call away. They know to stay vigilant and come right away if anything happens.”
“That’s not—”
“It’s for my peace of mind. Okay?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you, beautiful.” His eyes travel slowly from my hair to toes and back up again twice, unapologetic in his actions. “I’ll be back soon. Staying away isn’t an option.”
“Then I’ll hold you to that.” It’s a breathy whisper and his hands clench, nose flaring once before he turns to leave. Theo doesn’t look back, and I’m left a little achy, needy, and decide to go to sleep instead of watching TV.
The sooner I go to sleep, the sooner he’s back.
30
Gabriella
After locking the front door and checking all the others on this floor, I make myself a cup of tea and head upstairs. The house is quiet. I’m missing the tinkling of Mr. Pickles’s collar and small nails on my floor. I’m missing the calm—peace—that being home once brought me.
But now that I’m alone, I see the differences. Take note of the endless quiet. Understand how no one would hear my scream if something were to happen.
It hits me, now that Theo isn’t standing as my protector, how much has been taken from me. My security. My mental health. The ability to walk around my home without looking behind me or outside the windows.
“I hate this,” I say out loud, my hands trembling a bit. The longer I stand in front of my bedroom door, the more uncomfortable I feel.
My mind flicks through the last few weeks; a sick movie reel flipping through each horrific moment. Tim. The snake. The picture of the dead body and the words attached, and each one has this house as the common link.
I should sell. Get out and don’t look back.
But what would that solve?
Am I really being stalked, or is this a fucked-up coincidence? Why aren’t the police making a bigger deal out of it?
I’m alone.
“I need to work. Keep busy.” Because there’s no way I’ll go to sleep anytime soon. The what ifs will keep me from doing so. “Work. Set up and work.”
Turning away from my door, I walk to my studio and turn on the lights. Everything’s where I left it, with a painting still on the easel and each color I’ll need on the small table next to it. However, my water cups for dirty brushes are empty, and before I fill them, I decide to open the window.
It’s warm in here. A bit stuffy, and I don’t hesitate to spread the curtains apart and lift the pane. And it’s as I do, that I look across the yard and find two glowing sets of eyes.
They watch me. Unblinking.
And the last thing I remember is feeling faint and tripping in my haste to move, hitting my head on something hard.
It’s early morning when I come to and I’m still on the floor, my head pounding. It hurts so bad, and the position I’m in has left me with a sore neck. But it’s worse when I stand. Jesus, it’s so much worse, and my limbs—my entire frame—is jittery and unbalanced. There’s also a tender spot near my temporal bone and when I touch it, I find dry blood there with a small gash beneath.
“What the hell happened?” My eyes sweep the room, and I find nothing out of place but the small wooden stepping stool that I use to reach the top of my supply closet. It’s not in its usual place and I don’t remember leaving it here, but it’s obvious that I fell and hit my... “Oh shit!”
Turning, I rush to the still-open window with the sun barely lighting up the early morning sky and search the yard for those two sets of eyes. For anything that proves I’m not crazy. That I haven’t lost my mind within the carnival show my life has become.
Nothing. There’s nothing.
No animal within the foliage, but I know what I saw and they were not human eyes.
Could it be the snake? An owl, maybe?
“If I call this in, it could blow up in my face.” Like with the picture. Rubbing my sore forehead, I wince, but it helps alleviate a little of the mounting pressure. This is going to take more than a few ibuprofens to get through the day. “Coffee. Lots of coffee and pain meds.”
My reality and dreams and everything in between are a blur of crazy moments that are weighing heavy on me, and I miss Theo. Miss his smile and scent and the ease in which I forget the world around me when he’s near.
I close the window and survey the back once again, finding nothing, and I breathe out a sigh of relief. It’s easier to chalk this up to I hit my head and dreamed of eyes than the alternative. It’s probable, not far-fetched, and I’ll stick to it unless proven otherwise.
“Sounds good to me.” With my plan in place, I head to my room and closet to change. If I leave now, I can be back within the hour and pick up where I never began yesterday: painting. More so because I’m not trying to attract attention and slip into a large pair of overalls with a navy and white striped V-neck underneath.
There’s a little cafe near here that I visit every once in a while, with an amazing bagel selection that has my name all over it. That, and I’m going to need a triple shot of everything with a side of more caffeine to get through this headache.
The cut isn’t large when I look at myself in the bathroom mirror a few minutes later, dabbing at the area with a wet towel. It’s about an inch long and won’t require stitches, so small that a Band-Aid does the trick after I arrange my mass of bed-head hair into a bun at the nape of my neck. You can barely see it, the area not as swollen or bruised as I originally thought it’d be, and my fair complexion helps.
“Not bad at all.” With one last look after brushing my teeth, I head downstairs and out the door. It’s a good and sunny morning for a walk, and I could use a bit of time to clear my head because something inside me knows those eyes were real.
That I’m not crazy.
“That’ll be...” I don’t hear the rest as I’m paying attention to the person beside me. She smells of too much perfume and looks better than she did the last time we spoke, but still reeks of a bitterness that burns my nostrils. Is that really coming from her? The scent is a bit nauseating, but I manage to hand over my debit card to the employee with a smile on my face. “Your order will be ready in a few minutes, Miss. Under what name?”
“Gabriella,” Elise answers for me, her body moving a little closer. “Her name is Gabriella.”