Chapter Sixty-Three Kiersten
Chapter Sixty-Three
Kiersten
Kiersten sank down on the family room couch with a box of Keebler Fudge Stripes cookies and shoved one into her mouth.
She’d been so good since she started running with Reggie. She’d lost six pounds since they started the Experiment, and she could now button the jeans she’d worn to chaperone one of Matthew’s field trips when he was in fifth grade.
But the cockroaches . . . she shuddered and stuffed another cookie into her mouth. Her body screamed for sugar as her mind tried to block out the hissing . . . the legs . . . the antennae.
A new shudder convulsed her body as she watched Piper use a piece of cardboard to heroically collect each carcass, slide it back inside the cardboard tube, insert it into the box, and seal the whole thing shut with packing tape.
Only a true friend would gather cockroach cadavers in your kitchen and then dispose of them. She said a silent prayer of gratitude for Piper and the random forces that had brought them together.
After carrying the box out to the curb, Piper sank down on the couch beside her. “I’m so sorry about all this.”
“Sorry?” Kiersten blinked. “How could Madagascar hissing cockroaches possibly be your fault?”
That’s what the packing label inside the box said. Live Madagascar Hissing Cockroaches from the Happy Valley Farm Pet Supply Store.
Piper pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed. “It’s Hawkeye Slaughter. My stalker. He’s disappeared and joined some kind of antigovernment militia group.”
“Is this the guy you told me about before?”
“Yes.”
“I still don’t see how this is your fault.”
Piper ran a hand through her hair. “Hawkeye obviously intended to send those cockroaches to my house, and they were delivered to your house by mistake. He sent me worms, too, remember?”
Kiersten shook her head. “But this box had my address. And my name.”
Piper frowned. “That’s weird.”
“Maybe someone with a similar name and address has an exotic pet? And they’re ordering these things for their gecko or something? And they sent them to me by accident?” Kiersten asked hopefully.
Because surely that was a more plausible explanation than a crazy member of an antigovernment militia with a grudge sending hissing cockroaches to Piper’s neighbor on purpose?
This wasn’t a John Grisham novel, after all. Or an episode of Ozark. This was a nice, quiet neighborhood in the Washington, DC, suburbs.
Then her mind began to skim through the headlines she’d read over the years .
. . about the Russian sleeper spies who’d spent years pretending to be a normal suburban family, until they were arrested by the FBI .
. . or the double agent who left messages for his Soviet handlers while walking his dogs in a Northern Virginia park.
Or the Cuban spies who passed stolen documents to their handlers at a Safeway in Georgetown.
Things like this didn’t happen at home in rural Minnesota—as far as she knew—but things like this did actually happen out here.
Kiersten closed her eyes and forced her mind open, wide open, pushing herself to really consider the possibility that a dangerous person was targeting her neighbor.
What if Piper’s fears were real? What if Piper wasn’t paranoid?
“But why would someone go to all this trouble to do something so mean?” Kiersten asked.
“Because they’re crazy.” Piper shrugged. “And crazy people do crazy things. Something even creepier showed up on my doorstep this afternoon.”
“What could be worse than Madagascar hissing cockroaches?” Kiersten asked, dread slinking up her spine.
“A man with handcuffs, an ostrich feather, and a bag full of sex toys.”
Kiersten’s mouth dropped open. “What?”
Piper explained what had happened that afternoon.
Kiersten gasped. “A sex man showed up on your doorstep?”
“That’s right.”
“Is that a . . . thing?”
“Apparently.”
“Is that why you now have a puppy the size of a Shetland pony?” She gestured to Piper’s backyard, where a chocolate brown puppy chased the girls around the swing set.
“Yeah. I just feel better having an extra set of ears in the house when Brendan is out of town.”
Kiersten tossed the package of cookies onto the coffee table. Maybe the sugar rush was clouding her judgment. “Maybe . . . maybe this Hawkeye Slaughter guy is just trying to scare you. Maybe he has no intention of hurting anyone.”
The corner of Piper’s mouth curved in a faint smile. “Because most people are good?”
Kiersten’s mind wrestled with the dichotomy presenting itself here. People could be angry, rude, impatient, and petty, but in her experience, most people were decent and kind.
Then her mind traveled back to Dottie’s wedding announcement—if everything she’d just read in the library was accurate, then one of her neighbors was truly evil.
“Maybe he’s . . . Hawkeye the Kindly Stalker?” she asked tentatively.
Piper shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
“Maybe he’s just . . . lonely?”
“He’s probably very lonely,” Piper conceded. “But I don’t think inviting him over for hotdish is going to solve his many problems.”
“You can move in with us,” she said impulsively, squeezing Piper’s hand. “We’ll protect you.”
“With what? Dairy products?”
Kiersten’s face broke into a smile. “I could kill him with Midwestern kindness.”
“You could build a lethal hotdish bomb using nothing but cream of mushroom soup and your bare hands.”
“I’m serious,” she said. “Stay with us when Brendan travels. Until this . . . situation settles down. At least until they find this Hawkeye person.”
Piper took a deep breath and exhaled slowly.
“I’ll talk to my old boss again and see what they can do, though I suspect the answer is nothing.
I’ll talk to Brendan and see if he can ease up on his travel for the next few weeks.
He gets paid to protect diplomats from bad guys.
He’s more than capable of protecting his own family.
And I’m more than capable of protecting my family too.
But I’d feel better if he were home more often. ”
“Would that be enough to make you feel safe?”
“I don’t think anything will ever make me feel safe.” A wistful expression haunted Piper’s features, and Kiersten’s heart suddenly ached for her friend.
Her fingers clamped into a fist, and she longed for the power to wipe the past from Piper’s mind. The drug dealers and human traffickers, Mr. Claussen and his shovel, the bomb threat and everything that followed.
It didn’t seem fair, that keeping other people safe meant Piper could never feel safe herself.
“I just wish I knew what he was planning,” Piper said quietly.
Kiersten rose to grab Dottie’s diary from the kitchen island. “Speaking of bad guys, I have something else to show you.”
“Now what?” Piper asked warily as she returned to the couch.
“I think . . .” She took a deep breath. She didn’t want to say these words out loud, but in her heart, she knew they were true. “I think Richard Davis is the evil husband in Dottie’s diaries.”
Piper sank back against the couch cushions. “Seriously?”
Kiersten nodded. “And I also think his sweet wife who just had cataract surgery and fed us pecan pie is actually Peggy, the mistress.”
Piper’s mouth dropped open. “No way.”
“Way.” Kiersten handed her the diary. “Read this.”