24. Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Four
B rooke stopped short in the middle of the dorm’s hallway, staring down the long corridor at the box outside her door. She approached it cautiously and froze when she spotted the picture on top of it of a couple sitting at an outside café table. A man had his face buried in a woman’s neck as he kissed her, but the woman’s face had been replaced with Brooke’s face. Her stalker had written This will be you and me soon! in what had to be Brooke’s favorite red lipstick.
She’d lost a tube of it from her purse. She’d left it unattended for like two minutes in the library while she returned a book to the stacks a week ago.
The fear built in her gut and rose up to her throat, choking off her air. Scared, she sucked in a slow breath and let it out to calm her racing heart and the anxiety she’d developed since returning to school after Christmas a month ago.
“I can do this.”
“Do what?”
Brooke jumped, spun around, and gasped out her fright when her friend Mindy Sue surprised her. “Don’t do that.”
Mindy Sue held her hands up in front of her. “Sorry. What are you doing?”
Brooke stepped to the side, unable to put into words what had been happening to her these last few weeks. @youseeme had gone from leaving her online messages to leaving her pictures of her he’d taken without her knowing around campus and in town with gifts. He liked to leave them on the bulletin board attached to her dorm room door.
Mindy Sue stared down the hall. “Shit. Another one.”
“My favorite morning treat from the Donut Hole. And a message in my lipstick.”
“What the actual fuck!” Mindy Sue folded her arms over her chest like she wanted to protect herself from this madness. “Maybe you should go home. Fix things with him. Tell him and your mom—”
“No. I can handle this. I’m a grown-up. Cody made his choice, and I have to live with it.”
“Then it’s time you talked to campus security and the police and let them know someone is stalking you.”
She didn’t want to believe that, but the evidence had been mounting for months. This person hadn’t just been commenting online, he’d been in her life, at her home, following her at school.
They walked all the way down the hall to their door. The box of donuts seemed innocuous, except that it came from the shop she loved. Put that together with the creepy photo/note and other items left at her door—the scarf she’d tried on in a boutique downtown, the earrings she admired in a shop window after picking up a coffee at the local Starbucks, and the margarita pizza someone had delivered to her dorm room from her favorite pizza place while she studied for a test—all that equaled stalker.
Even creepier, someone had covered the bulletin board hanging on her door with a collage of photos of her on campus with friends, at the café where she loved to grab a snack, standing by the bike rack, talking on the phone. In the center was a picture of her sitting on the lawn, her back to a tree, and her face turned up to the sun, tears streaming down her face. Whoever was watching her wrote on the back, I miss you more.
Mindy Sue opened the box and stared at the half dozen each of chocolate glazed and sugar donuts. Brooke’s favorites. “That’s seriously creepy. Are you sure you have no idea who is doing this?”
“None. As far as I can tell, the pictures of me all over campus and town span the last month.”
Mindy Sue pointed to one of the photos on the board. “That’s us outside the movie theater two days ago. And at the library about ten days ago.”
She’d taken the first pics down, but whoever took the photos put them all back up again. Now she just left them there. Whoever was doing this to her wanted her to see them every time she came back to her room. They wanted to remind her of them.
It freaked her out.
Someone was out there, watching her, waiting, pursuing her, and doing it all behind her back. And it needed to stop before it got worse.
Mindy Sue picked up the photo. “Does the guy look familiar?”
She shook her head. “I’m guessing it’s a photo of some random couple he, or she, saw while following me and this is his fantasy for us.” That sent a cold shiver down her spine.
Mindy Sue scrunched her lips and nose with revulsion. “I just…who the fuck thinks this is any kind of way to try to be with someone?”
“I’d prefer a silly pickup line over this.”
Mindy Sue put her hand on Brooke’s shoulder. “Call Cody. He’s got connections. Maybe he can help.”
“No. I need to do this on my own.” She couldn’t rely on Cody anymore. She needed to stand on her own two feet and build a new life for herself without him in it. “It’s not like this person is threatening me.”
“Not yet. But he keeps coming to our room. Sure, right now he’s dropping stuff at the door. What happens when he wants in?”
Brooke’s stomach dropped. “You’re right. It’s just…I don’t need this right now.”
Mindy Sue put her hand on Brooke’s shoulder and stared at her in sympathy. “I know. But you have to go to campus security and file a report.”
A tingle of fear danced up her spine, like someone walked over her grave. “Will you come with me?”
“Of course. What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t hold your hair while you puked, or go with you to report a stalker?” Mindy Sue put her hands on her hips. “I mean really.”
Despite the fear still tightening her gut, she laughed. “You’re the bestest friend ever.”
“Damn right. Now let’s collect everything the psycho left you and take them with us. From now on, you don’t go anywhere alone. Keep your eye out when you’re on campus and in town. Don’t drink or eat anything someone else gives you.”
“What?”
“You never know if he’ll roofie you or something,” Mindy Sue said, staring down at the seemingly innocuous donuts. “What does this guy want?”
“I don’t know, but I wish he’d just leave me alone.” Her shoulders sagged.
Mindy Sue put her hands on Brooke’s shoulders. “You’ve got a lot on your plate. This is the last thing you need. Stress is not good for you.”
No, but it had become her constant companion, along with the bone-deep sadness she carried with her. That picture of her crying beneath the tree showed the depth of the sorrow she felt every second of the day. How many other times had this bastard spied on her when she couldn’t stop the tears or pain from sucking her under and leaving her raw?
Why did he care about anything she did?
Why wouldn’t he leave her alone to grieve in peace?
She wanted it to stop. She wanted the pain and sadness to stop. She wanted everything to go back to the way it used to be, when Cody was her best friend and a box of donuts didn’t freak her out.