I tap my fingers on the side of my own as my heart drums inside my chest and I have to work very hard to keep the image of Jackson, dead, out of my head.
My stomach twists into knots.
A dry heave leaves my lips.
Is it Will?
I wretch again, getting on my knees and dropping my phone onto my queen bed as I dip my chin, coughing, my hair sticking to my temple, my lips, my cheekbones.
My stomach cramps and I feel dizzy, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to vomit in my bed. I snatch up my phone and run to the bathroom in bare feet, flicking on the light the moment before I crouch down in front of the—thankfully clean—toilet bowl.
I bow my head and try to breathe, my phone between my fingers, and pressed to the floor.
But after I squeeze my eyes tight shut once, I notice my screen light up.
The nausea miraculously floods away, leaving a cold chill in its wake.
I see the message as I sit back on my calves.
From the same number.
Unknown
3… 2… 1…
My breath catches.
Then, like they’re already there, a pounding starts at the door.
NINE
NEVE
My heart races as I shove my feet into my Uggs, then open my bedroom door.
Silence now as I look straight through the kitchen and the living room area, Cynthia’s closed door positioned in the latter, toward the entrance. She has a framed Frida Kahlo hanging on it.
The front door is closed. Locked. Because we always lock up after ourselves. We’re girls in a city.
But a heartbeat later, a fist slams against the door and nearly rattles it off its hinges. Well, maybe not quite, because aside from the fucking back alley door, Casper Bennet takes security seriously. The door is heavy and the lock is a deadbolt.
But going in through the back?
Did Casper just let them up in the entrance from the shop?Thatone is kept locked. It’s how Cyn and I usually get in, and it lets me scope out the books after hours.
But Casper could have let someone in. He’s polite if thorough, but if it was someone semi-famous, or charming, or…
Fuck.
Maybe it isn’t Will at all.
And if it’s who I’m starting to think it is, it makes a hell of a lot more sense on why Mr. Bennet would let them in.
I squeeze my phone in my fist in the jarring silence between a likely-hockey player nearly knocking my door down and me, motionless in my bedroom.
But how would either of them know where I live? I know it’s possible to find out, with an eclectic place like this. Especially since they have reach, and hell, their coaches are probably friendly with the police but to give them my address? That would set them up for some liability if… if I got hurt.
Whoever it is knocks hard on the door again, like they’re going to tear it down with nothing but their fist.
