Chapter 15
Sasha
After Hillary posted about her, Sasha had been a mess. Luckily, she had lots of good content saved up because she hadn”t been able to control her thoughts enough to film anything new. She was obsessing about the accounts and monitoring the comments and follower sections. That was when she found an account that had started following the accounts after Hillary”s post. They had gone back and liked all the videos.
It seemed harmless, until that account had DM”d her.
Sasha, it looks like I found you. How do you like working for the Magic? Once again working your own magic on their account. I can tell exactly when you started. You should show your beautiful face more. I”ve missed you. - P
Her heart was pounding out of her chest, and she automatically deleted the DM and blocked the user. She didn”t know what else to do. She had never told anyone besides her sister that she had a stalker. He had started to get bold before Sasha turned off all her old accounts. She hadn”t told anyone because her family already had such a negative response to her being an influencer, she didn”t want to throw this on top.
And soon after she had gotten this job, she had thought she was putting this all behind her. Now she didn”t know what to do. She couldn”t just get rid of the accounts. She didn”t want to quit. She also didn”t want anyone to know, but she would be lying if she said she wasn”t scared.
The Gala was in two days, and she had a lot on her plate to get ready. She had finalized the list of charities weeks ago, but there was still a lot to handle. This wasn’t really part of her job, but she was good at this kind of thing and was happy to be helping, especially for such a good cause.
After holding it together at work for the day, she made her way to her car. The tingle crept up her spine as she stepped out into the open parking lot. This anxiety of being watched had been gone since moving here but had been creeping back in slowly. After that email, it was amped up like it had been before.
Quickly, she made her way to her car and got in. Then she turned the key. Nothing. She tried again and nothing. Damn it. Could this have happened at a worse time? She got out and lifted the hood and looked at it like she had any idea how anything under that hood worked.
Getting back in her car, she turned the key again, praying it would start. Nothing. She started digging through her purse for her phone to call a tow truck.
“Hey,” said a deep voice as hands hit the roof of her car and a body leaned in. She screamed and reached for her pepper spray.
“Fuck, Sasha, it’s me,” the voice said as it nimbly moved to the front of the car before Sasha sprayed the little pepper spray on her key chain. “Did you just try to pepper spray me?”
That time she recognized the voice. Conner.
“Conner!” she gasped.
He came back from around the hood. Concern covered his face. “Are you okay?”
She clasped her hand over her heart and dropped the pepper spray. “Yeah…I’m sorry,” she panted still trying to catch her breath.
“No harm done,” he said with a small shake of his head. His eyes were wide with concern. “But I’m serious, are you okay?”
“No. There’s something wrong with my car.”
“I can see that, I was really referring to the pepper spray,” he said, eyeing her carefully.
“I’m sorry. You just startled me.” Her heart rate was slowly returning to normal, but this situation from her car to her stalker had her anxiety through the roof. She got out of her car and walked around to the hood to look at it, still with absolutely no clue how it worked. She could check the oil and change a tire, but that was where her car knowledge ended.
Conner came around her and joined her looking at the engine. “What’s going on?”
“It won’t start,” she said with a shrug.
“Let me go get my car and I can give you a jump.”
“Okay,” she said, nodding.
Moments later Conner was driving his car next to hers and popping his trunk to get out charging cables. Something about the sight of him hooking up the cable and taking care of things helped her to calm down a little more. Conner McPhee was definitely someone she wanted on her side, and she didn’t realize just how much until that moment.
“Try it now,” he said.
Still nothing. “Hmmm,” Conner said. “It could be the starter? Do you have a garage you like to use? We might have to get it towed.”
Something about the way he said ‘we’ comforted her. For so much of her life Sasha masked her problems. It would be nice to have someone like Conner on her side. Even when they fought and he was being an ass, she never questioned whether he was a good guy or not. He was just someone who exudes goodness, even when he was being a dick.
She shook her head. “I haven’t needed to use one since I moved.”
“Okay, I’ll get it towed to the garage I use. I’m sure they’ll take good care of you.” He took out his phone and walked away from her.
If it wasn’t a battery, was it possible someone had tampered with it? She looked at the engine a little closer to see if she could see if anything looked like it had been cut or messed with. But once again, she knew nothing about how the engine worked.
“The tow truck is on its way. Since the parking lot is secured, we could just leave a key on the seat, and they’ll take care of it. I can take you home and help you figure this all out.”
“It’s a secure lot?”
“Yeah,” he said, gesturing to the parking attendant’s stand.
“Right, so they would have known if someone came and messed with it,” she said to herself with a sigh of relief.
Conner was quiet. She looked over at him and he was studying her with an expression she couldn’t read.
“What?” she asked defensively.
“Sasha, what’s going on?” he asked seriously.
“What do you mean?” she asked with an obviously fake carefree quality.
“Well, you tried to pepper spray me, then you asked if it was possible someone could have tampered with your car,” he said, his eyes pinning her in place.
“I told you. You just startled me.”
“You can tell me. Is something happening?”
Her traitorous trembling lip gave her away. When Conner’s expression changed and he took her hand, she broke. Before she could get herself back under control, she took her hand back and buried her face in her hands crying.
“Hey,” Conner quickly wrapped his arms around her. She wished it wasn’t as comforting as it was, but something about being in his strong embrace did start to calm her down.
“I’m sorry,” she said. The sound was muffled by the fact that her face was still in her hands, and she was pressed close to his chest. Finally, being able to take a deep sigh, she breathed him in. He smelled fresh from his shower but there was an earthy quality to him, she would wager it was from his beard balm, but he smelled incredible.
“You have nothing to apologize for,” he said, rubbing her back.
She finally collected herself enough to pull away and carefully wipe the tears from her eyes. She looked up into his eyes that were full of so much kindness it almost broke her again.
“Just an unwanted visitor from the past. Hopefully he’ll get the message though,” she said hoping he would leave it at that.
He evaluated her for a long moment. “Okay, why don’t I take you home?”
“That’s not necessary, I can just call for a ride,” she said, getting her phone.
“That’s silly. I can take you home.”
She chewed on her lip and looked up at him. Why did she yearn to be back in his arms? “Okay,” she finally said with a deep sigh.
“Okay,” he said as he unhooked the cables and put them away.
Sasha gathered her things from her car. Conner took her work bag from her and set it in his back seat. Something about that simple gesture pulled at her heart and made her smile. He pulled out his phone and pulled up her contact.
“Put your address in here and I’ll pull it up on GPS and get you home.”
She did so as he opened her car door. This was a version of Conner she hadn’t seen before, but somehow it was exactly what she needed. If she could untangle this messy web she found herself in again, she might just have to change the way she thought of Conner McPhee.