by B Ivy Woods
“Could it be an ex? Someone who’s pissed that you’ve moved on?”
“I don’t think so. I hadn’t dated anyone seriously before we started dating the first time around. After we broke up, I saw someone off and on, but she is now married with a family of her own.”
Rae stood up a little taller and played with the offensive white box on her desk. “You only dated one person somewhat seriously in the time we spent apart?”
“Yeah.”
“But it’s been years.”
“I know. But none of the women were you.”
Stunned, Rae walked over to her office chair and sunk into the seat. He hadn’t dated anyone seriously since they’d broken up. She didn’t know why she was shocked by this information because neither had she.
“Ditto.”
Flint didn’t respond. Since he had nothing to add and she wanted to stay on task, she continued. “We need to figure out who sent these to me.”
“I agree. Was there a label on or inside the box?”
Rae took her time examining the box and shook her head even though Flint couldn’t see her reaction. “Nothing on the box or inside of it. Which makes sense. What florist would deliver dead flowers to someone? This had to be a special delivery.”
“Maybe asking the front desk if they saw who delivered the flowers might provide a lead? Other than that, I’m not sure if there’s much we can do.”
Rae knew he was right. If Susan didn’t see who delivered the flowers, then there was the chance there might be cameras at the front doors, but she might not be able to access the footage.
“While you go do that, I’ll do some digging of my own. Is the camera I set up in your apartment still working properly?”
“Yes. I check the footage every other day or so for anything suspicious, but have found nothing yet.” Rae took a breath before continuing, “I’ll let you know what Susan says, and if you find out anything, let me know.”
“Sure. I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Okay, bye.”
Rae hung up her phone and immediately picked up her office phone. She dialed the front desk and waited for Susan to pick up.
“Hey, Susan, thanks for picking up that package for me a few minutes ago. Did you see who delivered it?”
“Oh, it was no problem, dear. And no. I stepped away from the desk, and it was there when I came back. Why?”
“I’m trying to figure out who sent it, and there was no name on the package. Do we have cameras at the front door?”
“We do, but they haven’t been working for the last week. We are waiting for the security company to come back out and finish fixing them.”
Rae leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. Just her luck.
“Thanks for your help.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t be more helpful.”
Rae disconnected the call. She placed her hands over her face. Did this warrant going to the police? Technically, this wasn’t stalking, and it wasn’t harming her. It was just a nasty prank that would now bother her for the rest of the day. She checked her cell phone but saw nothing pressing. She took the photo and sent it to her girlfriends to see if they had any ideas of what to do.
Rae: Check out what I got today.
Jules: Someone sent you dead roses? Who would do that?
Rae: Your guess is as good as mine.
Liv: Um. That’s pretty fucked up.
Rae: Tell me about it.
Eve: This is taking me back to the text messages. And you got another one a few weeks ago, right?
Liv: Yeah, that was my second thought.
Rae: Yep. Looks like that person is getting a little bolder. I talked to Flint about it earlier, and he had no clue who it could be. We both agreed that it had to be someone connected to him, however, because this is not a coincidence.
Jules: Is there anything we can do to help?
Rae took a moment to calm herself down while she read Jules’s text once more.
Rae: I don’t think so. I’m lucky to have y’all in my life.
Liv: Yeah, you are.
Rae smirked because she could read the snark through the text message.
Rae: Hardy har har. I’m not sure what else to do.
Eve: Probably need Flint to connect the dots.
“My thoughts exactly,” Rae whispered to herself. She stood up, grabbed the box, and headed out of her office. Rae smiled at a coworker as she walked passed their desk to another hallway in the building. She found the garbage and recycling room. She placed the roses in the garbage and broke down the box and put it in the recycling bin. She returned to her desk, took a deep breath, and went back to concentrating on work to finish the day out strong.
A few hours later, as Rae was walking out of her office building, her phone rang. She answered it as she hurried to the metro station.
“Hey. What’s up, Flint?”
“Nothing. I was just checking in on you after the flower delivery.”
“That’s sweet. Did you find out anything about the flowers?”
“Not yet, but I’ll let you know if I do. I’m about to grab drinks with my father and who knows how long that will take. Are you headed home or out to a happy hour with the girls?”
“Headed home. You can come over when you finish up with your dad.”
“I might take you up on that. I’ll let you know when I’m done.” His voice dropped a few octaves, and the promise of more was laced throughout his words. It sent shivers down her spine.
“I’d like that. A lot. I’m at the metro, so I’ll talk to you later.” Rae waited for him to say bye before she disconnected the call.
With that, Rae entered the train station.
She browsed her phone as she waited for her train. Feeling a sense of relief when she realized the next train coming into the station was headed for Virginia, she briefly closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
Rae stretched her muscles to get a kink out of her neck, and when she opened her eyes, and she noticed someone a few feet away staring at her. Refusing to be the first to look away, she tilted her head as if to say What? He gave her a small smile as the train entered the station and didn’t break eye contact as he headed toward the train doors. Only when she had to get on the train did she break their stare as a crowd of people flowed onto the train. Once everyone was situated, Rae looked up again to find the man still looking at her.
16
Rae grabbed her phone out of her purse, trying to convince herself that she was overreacting. Every creak and noise she heard on the train made her jump. She was hyperaware of her surroundings and hoped people didn’t realize how on edge she was. She had never been so happy to see her stop in her life. Rae pulled up the note app on her phone. She wanted to write out the man’s description before she forgot.
“Five-ten or so, maybe in his mid to late sixties, brown hair mixed with gray, looked to be a white man. Average weight and build,” she muttered while typing to herself. After today, she wasn’t taking any chances. Could this man have been the person who delivered the dead roses to her office? Rae continued to ponder that thought as she briefly glanced in the man’s general direction, hoping that she would get to her stop sooner rather than later.
When the train pulled into her station, she darted toward the train doors and noticed that the man stood up too. His small smile returned, leaving a sick feeling in her stomach. Seconds felt like hours as she waited for the train doors to open. When they did, a new surge of adrenaline was coursing through her veins.
Her heart was pounding. As she started climbing up the escalator leading to the exit, she felt a little light-headed. Rae kept looking over her shoulder as she exited the station but couldn’t see the mysterious man because of the crowd also trying to leave the station. Thinking it was best to act like she was talking to someone on the phone while she walked to her apartment, she pulled out her phone and called Flint.
“Hey, babe.”
Rae smiled briefly at the sound of his
voice and the nickname he gave her. His words took away her worries for a second. “Hey, yourself. What are you up to?” Five blocks to go.
“Out to drinks with my dad, remember? How are you doing? You sound distracted.”
“Not too good. I think I’m being followed.”
“Wait, huh?”
Rae sighed and rubbed her temples. She was dreading having to repeat those words. “I think I’m being followed.” Four blocks to go.
“Where are you?”
The mild panic in Flint’s voice did little to calm Rae down.
“I’m walking home from the metro.”
“I’ll be over in thirty minutes.” Three blocks to go.
“Don’t worry about it. I shouldn’t have called I forgot you are out with your dad. I’ll call my mom, and she can come over.”
“No, I want to be there for you. Dad and I are just catching up, but I can postpone drinks with him.”
Rae hadn’t realized how much she wanted someone to come over until he said those words. She would have been pissed that anyone was telling her they were just going to bombard her without asking, but when he said it, she knew she wanted him right now. “That sounds great. Can we stay on the phone until I lock my front door?”
“Without a doubt. I’ll put you on speaker, so I can continue getting ready to head over.”
“I’m sorry that I disturbed you, but I was freaking out.”
“You never have to worry about bothering me. I’m happy you came to me. Did you talk to your parents or your friends yet?”
Rae shook her head no before she remembered that he couldn’t see her. “N-no.” Two blocks to go.
“Okay. So tell me what happened.”
“So you know the whole spiel about what happened with the dead roses at work. I left my office and headed for the metro. While I was waiting for my train to come, I looked up and noticed a guy was looking at me. And this isn’t saying that people don’t look at other people daily, but there was something more sinister in the way he was doing it. We were on the same platform, and as luck would have it, my train was the one he got on too. He kept staring at me, and once we reached my stop, I almost sprinted out of the train. Don’t know what happened to him after that.” Rae spared a glance over her shoulder but saw no one. “Do you think this is worth going to the police over?”
“I’m not sure. It wouldn’t hurt calling the nonemergency number and talking to someone, but there isn’t much they could do because he did nothing but look at you. And there isn’t enough evidence to show that he delivered those dead roses. And even with that, the person who sent them wasn’t trying to hurt you.” One block to go.
“So, there’s nothing I can do about this.”
“As much as it annoys me to say this, yes. But at the very least I can stay with you tonight if that would help you feel more comfortable. We can brainstorm about what might happen and try to figure out a solution to this problem. I’d have loved to have been there when the man was looking at you and—”
“I know, I know. But that wouldn’t have solved anything either. What I want to know is why? And how to stop it.”
She could see her apartment building from where she was standing and the sight pushed her to walk even faster.
“Rae? Are you still there?” Rae hadn’t realized she hadn’t said a word in several moments because all of her focus was on getting into her apartment and closing the door.
“Yeah, sorry. I’m almost home.”
Before she knew it, Rae had darted up the stairs to her building and opened the front door of her apartment. As she walked in, she turned on all the lights to make sure no one had been there. “I’m inside.”
“Does everything look okay there?” He must have assumed that someone might have come to her apartment too.
“Yeah, everything looks to be how I left it. Double-checking to make sure I locked the front door.” Rae checked the door before finally setting her purse on the couch. Although she usually took her shoes off at the door, she didn’t care at that moment and flipped them off where she was sitting.
“Okay, I’ll be over soon.”
“Thanks again. Bye.” She hung up and called Eve.
“What’s up, girl? You never call me unless it’s important.”
“Are you busy?”
“Just taking a break from an article I’m drafting. Is everything okay?”
“So, I told you about the flowers today.”
“Yeah. Did something else happen?”
Rae sighed and took a deep breath before she continued, “Well, after that, I think someone was following me.”
Eve said nothing for several moments before asking, “Run that by me again?”
“You heard that right.”
“What the hell is going on?”
Rae filled Eve in on everything that had happened and took a breath when she was done.
“Looks like I will have to hold Liv back from finding this guy. And you’ve never seen him before?”
“Nope. I wrote down a description of him, but I just described at least forty percent of the men in DC.”
“So if I had to guess, this was an intimidation technique. The man followed you onto a train and then watched you. Maybe he was a creep and thought you were attractive. As much as it pains me to say this, I rather it had been that versus someone stalking you.”
“I mean, he could have been, but who knows. He had no shame. Anyway, I don’t know what this means for me.”
“It means nothing. All you can do is tell the police and set up some extra safety precautions. You shouldn’t stop living your life over something that hasn’t been proven to be a threat. Keep doing the things you were doing before and see if this will shake itself out. Have you told your parents and Flint?”
Rae bit her lip. “Flint knows, but I’m concerned about telling my parents. My mom will flip. I never told her about the text messages from a few years ago or the one I got recently.” Rae took a deep breath and said, “I think this might be connected with the flowers someone sent me today.”
“And none of this mess started until you began seeing Flint again.”
And there it was. The harassment hadn’t started again until Flint was back in her life. And if he didn’t have any answers for her, then they had to work together to figure this out because it had to stop.
Rae’s phone buzzed as she pulled her shirt down over her head. After she got off the phone with Eve, she changed out of her work clothes and put some sweats on to feel more comfortable. And now Flint had arrived.
She released a breath and opened the door. There Flint stood in his dark jeans, navy blue T-shirt, and white sneakers. He had a book bag over his left shoulder and purple and white flowers in his right hand.
Rae had a sense of déjà vu as she remembered when he brought her purple and white flowers the first time around. It had been on one of their first dates together, which was a surprise that he’d planned.
“I thought you might want some real flowers to cheer you up and I remembered that you loved these.”
“When did you have time to grab them?” She took the flowers and let him enter her apartment.
“I have my ways. How are you feeling?”
“Better, now that I’ve had a bit of time to relax. Can I get you anything?” Rae enjoyed having him in her home. It gave her a sense of ease as she watched him make himself at home in her apartment.
“That’s good. But my surprise doesn’t end with these flowers. I’m going to run you a bath.”
“Wait. What?”
“You mentioned before that you were so happy about having a bathtub again, so I thought that would help you relax. I forgot to give you these bath bombs as a housewarming gift, but I brought them this time. I also brought wine too. A red blend that I hope is still your favorite.”
Rae smiled at him and said, “It is. What do you know about bath bombs?”
“Nothing. But my twin sisters do. They recommended it as soon as
I told them how excited you were to have a tub.”
She chuckled. “It’s good to see that you’re still taking advice from them.”
Flint rubbed the back of his neck with his hand and said, “Well, they have their moments when they’re useful.”
“I guess they do. Thank you, and please thank your sisters for me.” She stood up on her tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek.
“You’re welcome. I’ll work on the bath, and you relax on the couch.”
A few minutes later, Rae was easing her body into the bathtub. She hadn’t realized how much she needed this bath until she was lying in it. Flint had set up shop on the floor of the bathroom, stretching his long legs out in front of him as he tried to get comfortable.
Rae’s thoughts about the dead roses and the strange guy faded away. This bath was making her body feel warm and weightless, and she didn’t want to ruin that feeling by bringing up the madness that happened today.
Closing her eyes, she brought the wineglass to her mouth and sighed. This moment was fantastic and nothing could ruin it. She opened her eyes and saw that Flint was looking at her with a soft smile on his lips.
“Why are you smiling at me?”
“I can’t smile at you?”
“Don’t answer my question with a question, Mr. Lawyer.”
Flint chuckled before he responded, “I’m happy because you’re relaxed and happy. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Rae grinned before her face turned somber. “We should take some time and talk about what happened to me today.”
“I agree. How about you take your time in your bath, and when you’re wrapping things up in here, I’ll step out and order dinner if you’re hungry? Does Tex-Mex sound good?”
When Flint said “hungry,” Rae’s stomach let itself be known.
Laughing, Flint pulled out his phone and stood up before he sat back down. “Are you getting ready to get out of the tub now?”
Rae nodded and stood up. Flint turned around and grabbed a bright yellow towel that was hanging on her shower door bar and held it up for her. She stepped out of the tub and into his embrace, wrapping the towel around herself. She leaned up and gave him a peck on the lips before whispering, “Thank you.” If Rae could stay in this moment for the rest of her life, she would, but she knew there was something that needed to be cleared up before the end of the night.
