Chapter 7 Mara #2
The flowers and bracelet could have been from a grateful client.
The collector that I sold the painting to might have sent me flowers to match it.
The bracelet could be from anyone—I sell paintings and find rare pieces for rich men and women all the time.
But it feels like too strong of a coincidence that I would get these gifts from others so close to the one that I feel sure is from Alexander—the first edition Caravaggio book. That one can’t be from anyone else.
The first part of the week passes in a blur or work. I throw myself into preparing for the auction, reaching out to potential buyers. I meet friends for brunch on Saturday, and I smile and laugh and pretend everything is normal.
No other gift shows up for the rest of the week, and I start to think that maybe I overreacted. That maybe the book was a gift from Alexander, and when I didn’t try to find him to respond, he gave up. The other gifts were from clients. That’s all.
I actually start to breathe easier by Sunday night, until Monday morning rolls around.
I get to the gallery early to go over provenance documents for some pieces that clients are interested in purchasing from the upcoming auction, even before Claire arrives.
And as I walk into my office, I see a small square box wrapped in matte gold paper on my desk, sitting on top of a stack of papers I left there Friday night.
My heart nearly stops. I toss my tote bag down in my chair and reach for it, my fingers trembling as if it’s a bomb.
When I unwrap the paper and open the box, a pair of antique pearl drops with tiny diamond accents wink up at me.
I stare at them, my analytical art brain already kicking into high gear.
They’re Victorian era, if I had to guess, and worth a small fortune.
They're exactly the kind of thing I would choose for myself, classic and elegant with just a hint of edge.
Claire hasn't arrived yet. The gallery was locked and the security system was armed when I got here. There's no way anyone could have gotten in without triggering the alarm.
Except someone did.
I pick up the earrings with shaking hands, feeling the weight of them, the cool smoothness of the pearls. I should call the police. I should call building security. I should do something other than stand here, frozen, while my heart pounds against my ribs.
Instead, I put the earrings in my desk drawer and try to pretend I never saw them.
The week continues, and I feel like I’m slipping down a slow descent into paranoia.
I start noticing things I never paid attention to before.
I see a black SUV that I swear is parked across the street from the gallery on multiple days, its windows too dark to see inside.
A car of that color and type is nothing strange in the city, but I can’t help but feel that it’s the same car, that someone inside is watching, waiting, learning about me.
I stop wearing earbuds during my runs. I vary my route, my timing, trying to be unpredictable.
I check the locks on my windows obsessively and test the door to my apartment multiple times before I go to bed.
By the end of my second week back in Manhattan I'm exhausted, running on caffeine and adrenaline and jumping at shadows.
Annie calls me over the weekend, and I almost tell her everything—almost confess that I think someone is stalking me, that I'm scared and confused and don't know what to do.
But she sounds so happy, talking about the baby and how much better she's feeling, and I can't bring myself to burden her with my problems.
"You sound tired," she says, concern creeping into her voice. "Are you okay?"
"Just busy with the auction," I lie. I'm getting good at lying now, at pretending everything is fine. I think I’ve just about convinced Claire that it’s just work stress. "You know how it is."
"You need to take care of yourself, Mara. Don't work too hard."
I promise her I won't. We hang up, and I'm alone again with my fear.
There have been no more gifts after the earrings.
By the following Thursday, I start to feel safer again, the earrings and bracelet and book all locked away in a drawer in my office, the flowers long died and thrown away, the takeout eaten.
I start to feel like maybe I was overreacting again, and I’m glad that I didn’t burden Annie with any of it.
I work late Thursday evening, losing myself in the familiar comfort of art and the focus required to go over my spreadsheets for the month’s projections.
By the time I lock up, it's after nine, and the streets are dark and mostly empty.
I take a cab home just to be safe, walking quickly toward my building when the driver drops me off.
Nothing happens. No one follows me. No one jumps out of the shadows. I make it to my building safely, ride the elevator up to my floor, unlock my door and step inside, taking a long, relieved breath.
Everything looks normal. Exactly as I left it this morning.
Except… when I go into my bedroom, the window is open.
I stand in the doorway, staring at the window, at the curtains moving gently in the breeze.
I know I closed that window this morning.
I know I locked it. I've been obsessive about it all week, checking and double-checking, making sure everything is secure. I would never have left a window open anyway, or even opened one at all, it’s far too cold still for that.
But it's open now, and as I step into the room warily, I see that there's something on my pillow.
A single black rose.
My legs feel weak as I walk toward the bed, my breath coming in short, sharp gasps. The rose is perfect, its petals dark as midnight, its stem stripped of thorns. It's lying across my white pillowcase, either a promise or a threat, and I can't tell which.
I can’t breathe. I know I should run. I should get out of the apartment, call the police, call someone… do anything other than stand here staring at this flower that shouldn't be here.
Instead, I pick it up.
The stem is slick and smooth against my fingers, and when I touch the petals, they feel velvety and cool.
There's no note, no explanation, just this impossible rose in my bedroom that someone left for me.
Someone who can get past my locks, who knows where I sleep, who wants me to know they've been here.
The fear hits me then—really hits me, crashing over me in waves that make my knees buckle. I sink onto the bed, the rose still clutched in my hand, and I can't breathe, can't think, can't do anything but feel the terror coursing through my veins.
Someone was in my apartment. Someone was in my bedroom. Someone stood right here, right where I'm sitting now, and left this rose on my pillow.
I toss the rose back onto the bed as if it burned me, falling to the floor on my knees to grab for my purse that I dropped when I saw the flower. I grope for my phone, searching for the number for the police station with shaky hands.
“I need someone to come to my apartment,” I tell the dispatcher who answers, giving her my address. “I think there was a break-in.”
Two officers arrive twenty or so minutes later, clearly having been in no huge rush, and both men. They look tired and skeptical as I try to explain what's been happening: the gifts, the feeling of being watched, the open window, the rose.
They walk through my apartment, checking the windows and doors and looking for signs of forced entry. They find nothing. No damage to my locks, no sign that the window was pried open from the outside—not that anyone could easily get this high up—no evidence that anyone was here at all.
"Are you sure you locked the window this morning?" the male officer asks, and I can hear the doubt in his voice.
"Yes." My voice is sharp when I say it, but even I'm not sure anymore. Maybe I forgot. Maybe I'm losing my mind. Maybe all of this is in my head. I’m tired and stressed and maybe I was overheated last night and opened the window and forgot about it. Maybe this is my fault somehow.
But I know I didn’t put a fucking rose on my pillow.
"And these gifts," the older officer says, looking at me. "You don't know who they're from?"
"No."
"Could they be from a boyfriend? An ex?"
"I don't have a boyfriend. And my exes wouldn't do this. My last boyfriend was a couple of years ago and he doesn’t even live in New York any longer."
They exchange a glance, and I know what they're thinking—that I’m a paranoid woman, probably imagining things and wasting police time.
"Look," the older officer says, his voice gentler now. "Without evidence of a threat, there's not much we can do. The gifts could be from anyone. A secret admirer, a client, a friend. And the window—you might have just forgotten to lock it."
"We'll file a report," the other officer reassures me, as if that does anything at all. "And we can have patrol cars swing by your building more often. But unless something else happens, unless you receive an actual threat or see someone following you, our hands are tied."
They leave, and I'm left alone again with the rose and the growing certainty that I'm not safe here. That I might not be safe anywhere.
When the police officers are gone, I call a locksmith, needing to do something if they won’t.
He arrives after midnight, bleary-eyed, and charges me double for the emergency call.
He changes all my locks at my request, and checks every window to make sure they're secure.
It costs me a small fortune, but I don't care.
I need something to make me feel as if I might be able to be safe again. I need to believe that I can keep whoever this is out.
I’m as angry as I am upset. I just moved here, into this apartment that was supposed to represent my success, a dream spot in a dream neighborhood. Now it’s being sullied by… someone, and I have no idea who. Someone who thinks their obsession is more important than my peace of mind.
The locksmith leaves at two in the morning, and I'm exhausted but too wired to sleep. I pour a glass of wine and sit on my couch, staring at the rose that I should have thrown away already but, for some reason, haven’t been able to bring myself to.
It's beautiful, in a dark, twisted way, like everything else that's been happening. Everything I’ve received has been beautiful, elegant, artistic. These are the gifts of someone who thinks they know me, who is giving me things I actually want. Gifts that, under other circumstances, I’d be delighted to receive.
I think about the man in Boston again, about the way he looked at me, the intensity in his eyes. I think about how I haven't been able to stop thinking about him, how I dream about him at night, how part of me wishes he had asked for my number, wishes I had given it to him.
But that's crazy. He's a stranger, someone I met twice. There's no way he could be behind this. No way he could have followed me to New York, learned my routines, gotten into my apartment.
Is there?
I pick up the rose, turning it over in my hands and studying it like it might reveal its secrets. The petals are starting to wilt now, curling at the edges, but it's still beautiful.
I should throw it away. I should throw all of it away—the book, the bracelet, the earrings, the rose. I should purge all of these gifts that feel more like warnings, should erase every trace of whoever is doing this.
But I can't.
And sitting there, in the wee hours of the morning, a small part of myself is exhausted enough to allow myself to admit why.
Some part of me, some dark, twisted part that I don't want to acknowledge, likes the attention—likes being wanted this badly, being pursued this intensely. The thrill of fear mixed with something that feels dangerously close to desire.
Following an impulse I don’t want to examine too closely, I put the rose in a bud vase with water, setting it on my nightstand where I can see it from my bed. Then I climb under the covers, exhausted.
But I don't sleep. I lie there in the darkness, listening to every sound, waiting for something to happen.
Nothing does.
But I know, with a certainty that settles deep in my bones, that this isn't over. Whoever is doing this, whoever is watching me, they're not done yet.
And the worst part is that I'm not sure I want them to be.