Her client arrives and I don’t linger. I don’t have appointments on Sunday, so head to the university library to catch up on my studies. Each time I try to clear my mind and relax into the coursework, all I feel is Trent bolting from me in the darkness, anxiety screaming from every inch of his body.
I can’t leave him like that. There’ll be some way around his problem, I’m sure.
Because otherwise, I’ve got a crush on a rich maniac and that’s certain not to end well.
* * *
I’mon the bus home when I get a phone call from the police. The ink used on the card was blood and they obtained a DNA sample for testing but didn’t find a match in the system.
“I know this isn’t the result you wanted,” the officer calmly explains to me. “But we’ve put an alert out for all the patrols in the area. If you ever see someone, call emergency and we’ll be able to take it from there.”
I hang up, getting off at the next stop even though it’s four from my closest one, preferring the longer walk to be alone with my thoughts rather than avoiding eye contact on a vehicle packed with strangers.
The good news is whoever is bothering me isn’t my uncle. It could still be a complete coincidence that the cards started at the same time my mother told me he was out of jail.
And I don’t know how old her information is. The friend of a friend network might be good at gossip but it’s less reliable with facts. He might have been out for years, and the news just drifted our way at this moment. Trent indicated the intruder had been younger than I remember my uncle being, and that was ten years ago.
Unrelated. I roll the word around in my head to see where it lands.
A stretch of believability maybe but not impossible. That the taunts are image related could be a preference of whoever’s bugging me rather than a specific link to my past.
If the first hadn’t arrived before meeting Trent, I might have considered him a culprit.
I need to keep a better watch on my surrounding. Heightened vigilance until the threats stop coming or I’m able to move the hell out and get away.
My observation skills need to be top of their game.
Like that car, parked over the road but three or four houses down. I haven’t seen it before outside our neighbour’s house, but I noticed it when I left this morning and I’m noticing it twice as hard now.
Before I can second guess myself, I stride along the footpath, pretending for all the world that I’m just continuing my stroll, not a nefarious thought in sight.
There’s a man in the front seat of the car, low enough down that he’s hard to spot from a distance. The closer I get, the tenser his posture becomes. Someone who doesn’t want to be seen.
I draw level and glance inside, catching the food and drink containers that show he’s been out here for a while.
My system goes into high alert, pulse jumping in my neck like it’s a child desperate for parental attention. I wipe my damp palms against my jeans.
He might be casing someone else’s house.
Well, if so, it’s their lucky day. I get two steps past his window, far enough that he relaxes, then double back, knocking on the passenger side.
“Excuse me,” I say when all it elicits is a startled jump. “Can you give me a hand?”
The man has a three-day scruff coating his chin and cheeks, his eyes red-rimmed from too much coffee and not enough sleep. Unless he’s out here smoking pot but I can’t smell any.
He eyes me warily but eventually works the control to lower the window. Not that he makes any effort to meet my gaze.
“Hey, you’ve been out here a while,” I say, trying to memorise everything inside the car. A hard job considering the amount of refuse he appears to be collecting in his vehicle.
And what does his rubbish matter? I should’ve got far enough past the car to note the licence plate number, scribbling it down before searching for further details on my phone.
I take the device out, surreptitiously trying to get to the camera setting so I can snap a picture if he suddenly drives away.
“It’s a free country,” he snarls back, grimacing as he shifts in his seat. He looks a little aged to be conducting surveillance. Now I’m seeing him close up, it seems much more likely that he’s an aggrieved ex, stalking his former partner. Everything about him just gives off that vibe.
“It is. But did you notice anyone around my flat? We had a break-in last night and someone got badly hurt. Any help would really be appreciated.”
“I haven’t seen anything.”
