Chapter 24
Watcher
Maliyah
The morning after Lucas’s birthday was quiet. No dark sedans. No shadows to follow me around. Then the flowers appeared.
I'd run out to grab lunch for the team—sandwiches from the deli down the street. Twenty minutes of waiting, small talk with the guy behind the counter, normal everyday stuff. When I got back to my car, arms full of bags, I unlocked it with the fob and climbed into the driver's seat.
As I reached to put the bags on the passenger seat next to me, my heart slammed against my ribs.
Petals. Dozens of them. A wrapped bouquet sitting on my passenger seat, ribbon-bound stems peeking from crinkled cellophane. More petals scattered across the leather, dusting the dashboard, nestled in the cup holders, wedged between seat cushions.
The car I'd locked. The car no one else had keys to.
I scrambled out so fast my legs betrayed me.
The world tilted sideways as my body met asphalt, skin tearing against rough pavement.
The sting registered somewhere distant as I pushed myself up, backing away from the open door.
My heart hammered against my ribs as if warning me there might be something lurking inside worse than unwanted flowers.
My eyes darted across the parking lot. The woman loading groceries into her trunk. The teenager leaning against a pillar, scrolling his phone. The elderly man shuffling toward the pharmacy. Normal people. Ordinary people. Any one of them could be watching.
I called the police. Documented everything. Tried to keep my voice steady as I explained that someone had broken into my locked vehicle to leave flowers with a very specific meaning. I explained my restraining order. The officer who spoke to me sounded bored.
I forced myself to breathe through the conversation. Slow down. Think. While waiting for an officer, I looked over my car, still keeping my eyes out for things going on around me.
But I kept looking at the flowers—I recognized them.
Unique. And a memory came with them. "For my love. For the plans I have for us. A life of my affection and love." He’d said those words years ago. On the last anniversary we’d had together.
It was the last one but I remember thinking he was close to proposing.
It wasn’t long after that night when I ran away from Bryce.
The flowers were Blue Nigellas and I remembered that they symbolized deep love and affection, but he forgot that they were also supposed to symbolize harmony—a feeling I never had with him.
I looked back to my car at the flowers. No card.
No note. But I knew. And I lost the contents of my stomach.
Waiting for the officer to come, I sat on the ground next to my car.
The smell of my own sick overwhelming my senses.
And the tears ran. The feeling that I had lost all control over everything was too much to manage.
I called Felicity, asked her to keep the kids for the afternoon and that I’d be by later to get them.
It was hours before the officer finally showed and I knew within moments that nothing would come of it. That I would be blown off and the report would be buried under a pile of paperwork.
Three days later, the coffee was waiting for me. I walked into Grind—the café where Reed and I had our first date, not that I let myself think about that—and the barista smiled brightly.
“Andi! Hi!" Recognition crossed over Andi’s face when she met my eyes and beamed a smile at me. Caden’s cousin, Andi was amazing.
"Maliyah! Swinging in for coffee? How are you!?"
"I’m great, thanks! How’s it going here?"
"Fantastic! You’ll never believe it. I’m closing on this place next week. Bought it from the owners."
"No freaking way. That’s amazing. Congratulations!"
"Thank you! It’s funny, I saw your name on the mobile order list and almost wondered if it was the same Maliyah."
I hit a wall of cold in that moment. "What do you mean? I didn’t order yet."
"No?" She picked up a coffee from the mobile order area and showed me the cup. "French vanilla latte, extra cream. For Maliyah. Is that your normal order?"
My usual. The drink I'd ordered a hundred times. The drink Reed used to have waiting for me when I was running late.
"Who called it in?"
She checked her tablet, brow furrowed. "It came through the online system. Just says 'for Maliyah.'"
I reached for it, the cup shaking in my trembling hands. I barely registered the heat against my palms. I fumbled with my wallet, dropping a five on the counter even as the barista said, "It's already been paid for—"
"I gotta go. I’ll catch you later, Andi."
I was out the door before I could hear her response. Outside, I dumped the entire contents into the trash, watching the steam curl up and disappear. Then I stood there, scanning the street, my heart pounding so hard I could feel it in my throat.
I called the non-emergency line again. Same bored voice. Same polite dismissal dressed up as concern. But I knew it was more than they were making it out to be. I knew it was him. I knew he was watching me.
Officer James came to my apartment that evening.
He was maybe thirty, clean-shaven, with the kind of neutral expression they must teach at the academy.
He flipped open a fresh notepad like he was starting from scratch—which, of course, he was.
Different officer every time. No continuity. No context.
"Start from the beginning," he said.
So I did. Bryce. The restraining order. The car following me. The sounds of someone trying to get in at night. The flowers in my locked vehicle. The coffee.
I watched his face as I talked. Watched the subtle shift from professional interest to something closer to skepticism. I knew how it sounded. Thin. Circumstantial. The paranoid ramblings of a woman going through a bad breakup.
"I know how this sounds," I said. "But I know Bryce. This is exactly how he operates. Small things. Quiet things. Things that make me doubt myself. That's the whole point—he wants me to feel crazy."
Officer James's pen stopped moving. "I understand your concern, ma'am.
But we're dealing with incidents that could be attributed to anyone.
Or no one." He ticked them off: "An unidentified vehicle. A doorknob that might have been tried, with nothing to verify. Anonymous flowers. A coffee order with no name attached. There isn’t enough to show he violated the order. "
"The flowers were in my locked car."
"Is it possible you left it unlocked? Even for a moment?"
I stared at him. "No."
He nodded slowly, the way people do when they don't believe you but are too polite to say so. "Like I said, without concrete evidence linking these events to your ex..." He let the sentence trail off.
"So there's nothing you can do."
"I can increase patrols in your area. Note everything in the report." He met my eyes with practiced sympathy. "If there are more incidents, we can send someone to talk to him directly. But Ms. Davenport—be vigilant. If you see him, if you have any proof, call 911 immediately."
After he left, I checked every lock. Every window. Cycled through the camera feeds until my eyes burned.
Then I pulled up my messages. Scrolled to Reed's name. My thumb hovered over the text field. I typed: I need—
Deleted it. Typed: Something's wrong—
Deleted that too. I stared at our last exchange. Weeks old now. The silence between us a wall I didn't know how to breach. Part of me wanted to call him, hear his voice, let him tell me I wasn't crazy. He'd come running. I knew he would.
But then I remembered his face when we last spoke. The careful distance in his eyes. He'd made his choice. And I wasn't going to beg.
I locked the screen. Unlocked it. Went back to the cameras. I'd have to handle this alone.
Outside my window, the street was empty. But somewhere out there, Bryce was watching. I could feel it. And sooner or later, he was going to make his move.