Guarding the Athlete (Sapphic Security #7)

Chapter 4 Ruby

Ruby

Someone was watching me. I could feel it. There was a tingle on my neck, the sense that something dangerous was near me. Not even trying to be subtle, I stopped and turned around. The sidewalk behind me was empty.

My eyes scanned the windows, the parked cars on the street, and still I saw nothing. Maybe I was going crazy, but I could swear that someone had been following me for weeks.

Then again, maybe it wasn’t my imagination. It had been happening since the beginning of the season. Someone appeared to be stalking the biggest stars in women’s soccer. Some of the coaches too. And not in a “I want you to be my girlfriend” way. In a “I want to kill you” kind of way.

To be clear, no one had been killed. Thankfully. But one by one, star players were being threatened, too many for it to be a coincidence. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t getting nervous.

A player for the Chicago team received a series of threatening letters right before someone pushed her off the track of an elevated train.

Quick thinking bystanders had rescued her before she got run over – or electrocuted – but she’d been so freaked out she’d had to take a leave of absence from the team.

In Toronto a player came home from a road trip to find her cat massacred in her living room with a threatening note by the body.

In Atlanta another player had been rear-ended, and when she stopped, the guy tried to kidnap her.

The head coach for New York had someone shoot out the windows in her house.

And at least five other players had received threatening notes or had someone try to injure them while out in public.

We were all on edge. We didn’t know what the person – or people – who were doing this wanted, but one thing was clear: someone wanted to hurt us, or at least make us afraid.

The one thing that linked all the victims together was the International Games.

We’d all gone to Paris for the summer event, and one by one we were being targeted.

Was I next?

Holding my bag closer to my side, I picked up the pace.

My condo building was only a block away and once I was tucked safely inside I could take a breath.

I didn’t need to be anywhere until practice tomorrow afternoon, so I’d have some time to figure out how to get rid of this nervous paranoia I’d been feeling.

“Oh Ruby dear, you’re back.”

Mrs. Oliver, my downstairs neighbor, waited in the lobby, looking frazzled.

“Are you okay Mrs. O? You look upset.”

“I made chocolate chip cookies today, and I know you have such a sweet tooth…”

She paused and took a shuddering breath. “I was going to leave them by your front door and then I saw… oh it’s terrible, dear. Who would do that to you? I had to call the police.”

I took off at a dead run, bypassing the elevator and taking the stairs two at a time. I burst through the stairway door, slamming it against the wall so hard that the two cops in the hallway spun around, hands on their guns.

I saw my door and skidded to a stop.

You’re next!

The words were spray-painted on the wood and underneath were pictures. At least ten of them. Me at my favorite coffee place. Me leaving the stadium after a game. Me unlocking my car door in the underground garage. In every picture, my face was crossed off with a red X.

“Are you Ruby Wozniak?” one of the cops asked.

“Y—yes.”

I couldn’t take my eyes off my front door. The letters looked angry, not just the words but the strokes of the paint.

“Ma’am do you know who would have done this?”

I shook my head.

“Has anyone been threatening you? Angry ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend maybe?”

“No.”

I hadn’t had a girlfriend – or even a hook-up -- in so long I didn’t even remember what dating was like, let alone sex. Not that I was planning to share that with these guys.

“Well, we’re going to need to get a statement from you. It doesn’t look like they entered the unit, but if you’ll let us inside we can look around with you.”

“Okay.”

After checking their IDs to make sure they really were cops, I input the code on my keypad to open the door.

Letting one of the cops go inside first, I took a quick look around.

Nothing looked disturbed, but I still had the strangest feeling that someone had been inside my private space.

There was something in the air, something unsettling.

My fear was confirmed when we went into the bedroom.

Someone had made the bed. I never made the bed, much to my mother’s annoyance when I was a kid.

I stepped closer and saw that there was a stuffed animal on the pillow.

A pink bear wearing a spiked collar and a leather vest, like he was doing a BDSM scene.

His eyes were torn out, hanging by a thread.

Fear clogged my throat, but I pushed past it to tell the cops about the bear. They took pictures, then bagged up the bear in an evidence bag, but I doubted that they could do anything about it.

“Do you have some place to stay tonight ma’am?” the cop asked. “Since we don’t know how they accessed your apartment, it’s probably best you don’t stay here until you can get the locks changed, maybe get a security system.”

“Yeah, I can stay at my parents’ house,” I said.

I wasn’t too proud to run home to Mom and Dad. Hopefully they would know what to do.

“Would you mind waiting for me to pack and walking me to my car?”