Imogen
When I reach the bottom of Mom’s driveway, I see Amelia’s car. Her white sedan sits one house up—across the street from the Holloways.
Odd.
Rain pools in a shallow dip of the hood, proof it’s been sitting here a little while. Expecting her to be inside, I lean close to the fogged glass. But she’s not in there.
I try the door handle. It opens easily, and the interior light blinks awake, illuminating her cell phone abandoned on the front seat. I snatch it up to find an unread text from Wes, timestamped twenty minutes ago, asking her how work was.
I drop it back on the seat, glancing at the Holloways’, their driveway mostly hidden behind brittle trees and fog. From what I can see, Rory still isn’t home.
I wonder what Emmett will say when he gets back.
Amelia’s car is at the bottom of the Wickers’ sloping yard—the new neighbors in the modest cottage next door. I always thought it looked like something from a fable, the roses along the fence wild and overgrown.
I remember Mara mentioning them at dinner Friday night. If I recall, she called them reclusive. Or maybe she said shy. Something about them having a son.
I can’t imagine why Amelia would stop there… but my feet are already moving.
I need to find her.
Pushing past their creaking off-white picket fence, I quickly reach the Wickers’ front porch. The moment my shoe drops on the brick porch, the door unexpectedly swings open. My heart drops, taken aback by the sudden action.
A young man appears in the doorway.
It takes only a second for my mind to assemble him from the memories of The Incident. A scar slices across his cheek, the one I must have left when I smashed a water glass into his face at seven years old.
I scramble for another explanation. Maybe I’m imagining him. Maybe this memory is poisoning reality, trauma bleeding through my vision. The boy who hurt me cannot possibly live here, next door to Mom. He should be gone—across the country, behind bars, anywhere but here.
And yet… as I stare at him over a few quick seconds—which tumble in slow motion—I realize I’ve seen him recently. Since arriving to Blair.
It flashes fast: Rainbow Acres. The first day back. Him at the register. The way he said my name. I’d stared blankly at his face while my subconscious mercifully blurred his features into something unknown.
My stomach revolts. The cappuccino and scone I shared with Rory hours ago crawls up from my gut. I’m sure the look on my face is one of horror. I can’t help it—I can’t stop it. He knows who I am.
Five seconds—maybe less—have passed when he speaks first.
“I guess we’re doing this.”
His tone is smug, offhand. Like I’m another task to be completed off his list. And that task is dragging me into his house.
Because as soon as the words exit his lips, he reaches for my body and pulls.
I heave back toward the awaiting world behind me and let out the beginnings of a guttural scream.
It’s silenced all too quickly as his palm smacks across my mouth.
And in one swift motion, he tugs me in and slams the door shut.
I wriggle against him in hopes of freeing myself—but his hold is strong.
“God,” he chuckles. “Even your sister didn’t fight this hard.”
My sister?
“Amelia!” I manage to shout against his skin, the name muffled into his flesh. I open my jaw wider, tasting soap and salt and sweat as my teeth close on the pad of his palm.
He hisses a curse, and I wrench my head sideways as his hand jerks away.
But he doesn’t let go. His palm finds my mouth again, sealing it like duct tape as he propels me deeper into the house from behind, locking my arms behind my back.
His chest presses against my spine as he laughs softly against the back of my head, the hot, damp whisper of it causing my neck to convulse.
We pass from the entryway to the living room, down a narrow hall, and into a back bedroom without encountering another soul.
My teeth chatter uncontrollably as he kicks the bedroom door closed behind us, never loosening his grip, and marches me to the closet.
With one hand still clutching me, he fumbles for something on the top shelf, finally producing a long strip of soft black fabric.
A necktie. He cinches my wrists together with it, the silk burning my skin as he tightens it.
“Let me go!” I howl.
Parker shoves me to the floor so fast the world inverts, my body slamming against the shaggy beige carpet. With my hands bound, I can’t even brace, can’t even catch myself. I roll to my side, gasping, before forcing myself upright into a seated position, hair stuck to my wet face.
“My bad,” he mutters quickly, holding both hands up in innocence.
“I don’t want to have to be rough with you, Imogen.
But you were resisting.” He paces, then slaps his flattened palm against his forehead.
“This isn’t how it was supposed to go!” he erupts.
“I was going to come to you tonight. Properly. I’ve been practicing…
waiting for the right moment.”
He drops to his knees in front of me, anger drained from his face—replaced by a terrifying softness. Sweeping hair off my face, a new admiration in his eyes, he adds, “I’ve dreamt about getting you into my bedroom for years.” He smiles tenderly. “And here you are.”
He says it like I came here willingly. Like I’m not trussed up on his floor, horrified.
My grimace deepens. “Years? What are you talking about? And where’s my sister?” It comes out almost animalistic, rabid.
He doesn’t answer. He just stands and continues pacing the carpet, running his hands through his hair, muttering soundless fragments like he’s rehearsing lines, or thinking aloud.
I scan the room for escape routes, my bound wrists scorching with each twitch of effort.
There’s a queen bed made up in navy sheets, a dark wood desk with a neatly arranged computer, and a single window overlooking the forested backyard.
The latch is snapped down tight, a mesh screen stretched over the other side like a second layer of prison bars.
Beyond it, the storm thrashes the small strip of woods behind the house, branches clawing the air.
I try to map out a route: launch myself to my feet, dart for the door.
But I’d have to turn around to use my hands, and even if I somehow twisted the knob, he’d be on me before the door even cracked.
The window is no better. I wouldn’t get the lock undone, the screen popped, and my body squeezed through before he’d drag me back in. There’s no way out. Not yet.
Looking back at Parker, I can tell he’s locked in some private war, body stiffened, jaw twitching, trying to figure out what to do with me. Finally, he faces me again, straightening the hem of his black sweater, like he wants to put his best foot forward.
“I’ve always loved you, Imogen,” he says, sitting on the carpet again, crisscross now, his knees inches from mine. “Since we were kids. You welcomed me in when no one else did.”
My eyes scatter, trying to land anywhere but on his. Trying to remember, to understand how he could twist those brief days of childhood into this. We barely knew each other before it happened. He hadn’t even started at Blair Elementary yet.
“You love me?” I ask, voice cracking. “You don’t even know me. You’re just someone who assaulted me as a kid. I didn’t even like you then.” I’m crying again, thinking of it. Wondering how the hell I ended up here.
“Oh, Imogen, don’t cry,” he says kindly, leaning over to wipe a tear off my cheek, sweeping my pesky bangs out of my eyes, tucking a strand behind my ear. Like we’re lovers and not captor and captive. “And don’t say things you don’t mean.”
Revulsion shivers through me. I want to smack his hand away. I want to kill him.
“I do know you,” he continues. “I know… how nice you are to your customers at Bar Henry. You treat them like family. I know the way you remember their names, their favorite drinks… I know you stand at your window every night when you get home, looking down at the street before you close the blinds. Like you’re tucking the world in…
wishing it good night. And sometimes,” he says, a smile creeping across his face.
“Sometimes I hoped you’d see me. Just once.
Just one admiring glance. But you never did.
So I had to come here. To help you see me. ”
He’s… been watching me, following me. Even in Seattle.
My teeth are sinking so deep into my lower lip that I bleed. I suck the blood away.
I glare up at him. “It’s been you? Coming into my mom’s house? Hiding in the attic?”
Parker’s eyes drop to his shoes like I’ve complimented him, not accused him. He looks bashful, lips curling. “With the key left outside… how could I not?”
A fresh sting burns the backs of my eyes as the memory hits. How I accused Rory of stealing it. When really, he’d found it. After Parker must have dropped it.
He studies me. “I know what you’re thinking about.
You’re thinking about the Holloway boy. How you told him off.
” He laughs. “I heard the whole thing. It was awesome.” His smile vanishes quicker than it formed.
“I also saw what you did with him. And on the floor of your mother’s house like someone…
cheap. It was… unlike you.” He swallows, rage taking over.
“It made me much angrier than when I saw you down in the rowboat together. I was in your house, waiting for you. And you were off with this… fucking loser.”
Parker grabs my face and I squeal. He runs his thumb against my cheek. “He’s never going to be good enough for you. No one will. No one but me.”
I nearly spit at him. “And Frank Martin? The fake Facebook profile? That was you?”
He shrugs, fingers tangled in my hair, petting me. “I needed to get you out of the house somehow. I needed more time… to work up the courage to come talk to you.”
I blink away tears. “You’re sick,” I whisper.
“I mean, you’re really sick.” My voice gets louder, angrier.
“Let’s get one thing straight. I don’t know you.
I will never know you. We will never be together.
This thing you think is between us is something your sick fucking head concocted.
” I can’t even pretend to play his game.
The words are flying out of my mouth. “Now where is my sister?” I howl, hoping Amelia will hear me. Wherever she is.
A slap lands so hard it whips my head sideways. Fire blazes across my cheek; my mouth falls open in shock.
Parker stares at his shaking hand, palm up as if it betrayed him. “You made me do that. Why are you making me hurt you? You’re saying things you don’t mean. You don’t mean any of it. I know you don’t, Imogen!” He turns his head to the door. “Mother!”
The door creaks open instantly, like she’s been waiting in the hallway this entire time—hearing my screams but doing nothing. She closes the door carefully, making short eye contact with me before focusing on her son. She looks afraid, agitated.
She’s hardly changed from the image in my head.
“Do you remember me?” I ask her. I’m unemotional now, to the point. “I’m Imogen. My mom was Alice. She lived next door. We met years ago—when you first moved here.” My voice edges. “Your son has tied me up. Please. Go get help.”
But the entire time I’m speaking, I’m being drowned out while Parker gives her unintelligible instructions, whispering aside my pleas. I am mere background noise to his commands.
“Thank you, Mother” is all I hear him say.
She isn’t here to save me. She’s here because she’s part of this.
She ignores me, silently exiting, closing the door behind her.
“What did you tell her?” I say, frantic. “What is she doing?”
Parker plants a hand on my knee. He’s an emotional roller coaster.
“Imogen. Darling. Calm down,” he says, as though I’m a child throwing a tantrum. “Everything is going to be okay. I have you. I’ll keep you safe. Nothing else matters.”
“I don’t want you to keep me safe! I want to get as far away from you as possible!”
I can’t play along. My body and my mind won’t let me.
All I can do is repel him—no matter what that means for me and my personal safety.
My rage is boiling over; I can’t calm myself down.
Never have I wanted to make someone suffer until now.
If my hands were free, there would be bloodshed.
I would fight to the end to cause him pain.
Meredith appears in the doorway again, holding a long mint scarf. She hands it to Parker and swiftly leaves the room again.
“Wait! Why are you helping him?” I wail as the door closes. “Please!”
“Stop resisting. You know this is right,” he says, fussing with my tied wrists. For a moment, I think he’s untying me. But my body is jerked backward. The scarf slides between my hands, knotting me tight to the bedpost.
I crane my neck to bite his shoulder. Instead, he slams it into my jaw before I can bite down, pain ricocheting through my teeth. I kick at the wall with a sharp crack, hoping to spring off it and into him. But it only spins me sideways, dumping me in a twisted heap across his lap.
He caresses my flailing body for a moment, planting a kiss on my head, fondling my hair. Using the shift to his advantage, he slides a hand into my pocket and pulls out my cell phone.
“Just in case you’ve enabled voice text,” he says. For good measure, he snatches my keys from my jacket pocket. “When you’ve calmed down, I’ll be back.”
I scramble upright as best I can, the bedpost against my spine. “Where! Is! My! Sister!” I scream so loud it shreds my throat.
Parker bites his grinning lip and closes the door behind him.