Chapter 28 – Sydney #2
Great. More roses. I swallow a sigh. Ash probably ordered them the second he got off the phone with me.
The delivery guy doesn’t even make eye contact with either of us. He just walks toward me, and before I can thank him, he drops the box unceremoniously on the counter, takes a photo of it with his phone, and leaves without a word. The door clicks shut behind him.
“Wow.” Jade stares after him. “Rude much?”
“Maybe he’s late for another delivery?” Unlike the other boxes, this one is gray, the cardboard cheap and thin. There’s a card on the top, and I pluck it off, palming it. “Or he could just be having a bad day. You never know what someone else is going through when—”
I lift the lid and stop.
Stop, and stare.
I was wrong. They’re not roses. Inside the box are lilies. A dozen of them.
And all of them are dead and desiccated, black from age.
My stomach twists unpleasantly as the smell hits me. Not just dead flowers, but something musky, almost cloyingly sweet when mixed with the roses. Something like rot.
“…Sydney?” Jade’s voice comes from far away.
There’s something else crammed down into the bottom of the box. I shift the tissue paper to get a better look at it. A stuffed animal. A cat. Once white, and now…
Torn up the middle, covered in dirt and grime, and…
There’s something moving inside it. Writhing in the white of the stuffing, wriggling...
“Are those …?” My voice doesn’t sound like my own.
Jade moves before I can. She snatches the lid away from me, slamming it back into place so hard she crushes a corner of the cardboard box.
Maggots.
The stuffed animal was full of maggots.
“Don’t,” she says, her voice fierce, commanding. “Don’t look again.”
“Was there something dead in there?” I ask. My heart is hammering in my chest. I feel dizzy.
“No,” Jade says, a little too quickly. “No, it was just…it was just meat. Raw meat.”
Raw meat.
My stomach churns. The smell of rot is in my nose, in my throat. My mouth fills with saliva.
Jade notices I’m going to faint before I do.
“Fuck!” She lunges forward, catching me by the elbows before I can collapse, easing me down onto the ground.
“Justin!” she yells. “Get back here! We need some help!”
From somewhere far away, I hear footsteps pounding closer. But I can’t think. I can’t even breathe.
“I think I’m going to throw up,” I say conversationally.
“I think you’re in shock. Justin, take that out to the dumpster,” Jade barks. “Now. Don’t open it. Just get rid of it.”
From somewhere above me, I hear Justin’s voice, heavy with concern. “Is she okay?”
“Now, Justin!”
Justin mutters something and scoops the box up. The smell shifts with it, gagging me all over again.
“Tell me there wasn’t a dead thing in that box,” I say in a hollow voice. I don’t even care if it’s the truth. I need to hear it.
“There wasn’t a dead thing in that box,” Jade insists, crouching in front of me. She takes my face in her hands. “Look at me, Syd. There wasn’t. I promise.”
I want to believe her. But the image of that gaping white cat, the pale roiling bodies inside…
“Where’s Bea?” My voice comes out panicked. “Where’s my cat, where’s—”
I feel her before I see her. She nuzzles up against me, rubbing her head on my thigh. I scoop her up in my arms, burying my face in her fur and sobbing.
Safe. She’s safe.
“Why would he send that?” Jade asks, sounding horrified. “I mean… I know you two ended things on bad terms, but Alec doesn’t seem like the type to—”
“It wasn’t him. It wasn’t any of them,” I answer, voice muffled in Bea’s fur.
And it hits me then how much I know, in my heart, that they would never do something like that. Not to me. Not ever.
My hand unclenches. I realize I’ve been gripping something tight in my fist this whole time. The card.
Shakily, I set Bea down, and I peel it open and read it.
Flowers as sweet as you.
Justin covers my shift for the rest of the day.
But no matter how much I pace my apartment, or how many times I try to lose myself in mindless scrolling on my phone, I can’t stop thinking about those flowers.
Lilies.
Only one man has ever sent me lilies. Only one man would want to hurt me like this. He warned me, didn’t he? Told me he wouldn’t go away without a fight.
What is it he said to me, during my date with Ashton?
You’re going to regret fucking with me.
Chase. Chase is the one behind this, the one sending me these awful gifts. I’m certain of it.
I know I should be scared. I know, deep down, that fear is the right response.
But something else takes root inside me instead.
Fury.
It starts low in my stomach, molten and ugly, then spreads like fire through my veins. Rage for the years I’ve swallowed it down. Rage for every time he made me feel small and weak. And now, when I’ve moved on, when all of my thoughts don’t revolve around him, he chooses to do this?
I’m not afraid, because unmasking the demon tormenting me makes him real again. And real, I can handle. Because Chase doesn’t scare me anymore.
And as if he heard the realization click, my phone pings.
Unknown number: How did you like my little gift?
Another chime.
Unknown number: Don’t worry.
And another.
Unknown number: I’m only getting started.