Chapter 5 Rowan #2
I welcome the distraction. In the brief moments between cases, when I’m washing my hands or updating charts, my focus circles back to the note despite my effort to set it aside. Not the words themselves, the implication behind them. The fact that someone knew exactly how to get my attention.
Lila corners me near the supply room after lunch, her expression tight with concern she isn’t bothering to hide.
“You’re too quiet,” she remarks, leaning one shoulder against the wall as she watches me sign off on a chart.
“I’m working,” I mumble, sliding the folder into the rack and reaching for the next one.
She studies me for a long second, then straightens. “You always work. This is different.”
I meet her eyes briefly, considering how much to tell her. “I found a note in my locker.”
Her brows pull together immediately. “What kind of note?”
“No name,” I answer, “but enough to suggest someone is watching me without explanation.”
Her posture straightens, concern turning into alert. “You reported it?”
I shake my head once. “Not yet.”
“Rowan.”
“I’m still deciding what it means,” I counter evenly. “Reporting something vague without context draws attention I don’t want.”
Her mouth presses into a thin line. She doesn’t agree, but she doesn’t argue either. Lila understands that I look for patterns before I react.
“You’re not overreacting,” she states, more firmly than before. “If that helps.”
It does, more than I expected.
“I’ll walk you to your car,” she adds.
“I appreciate that,” I reply, and mean it. “But I have errands after.”
Her eyes narrow. “You’re not going alone.”
“I’m not helpless,” I remind her gently.
“I didn’t say you were,” she huffs, folding her arms. “I said you’re not walking into uncertainty alone.”
The word uncertainty sends a chill up my spine. We compromise on a check-in text once I reach my apartment. It’s not ideal, but it avoids escalation before I understand what I’m dealing with.
The afternoon drags. I finish consultation notes, review imaging, field questions from residents, and give concise answers that leave little room for misinterpretation. By the time my shift ends, my shoulders ache with tension I haven’t allowed myself to release.
The walk to the parking lot feels longer than usual. My keys sit threaded between my fingers, a habit rooted in practicality rather than fear. My eyes scan the lot. Nothing appears out of place. No footsteps in sync with mine. No engines idling. Still, the feeling of being watched follows me.
The drive home passes in a blur of brake lights and familiar turns. I pull into my apartment complex as dusk gives way to low light, the sky dimming above the buildings. The lot is quiet, cars scattered unevenly across their spaces.
I notice the door the moment I reach my apartment. It’s locked with the deadbolt in place. The frame, however, shows faint marks along the edge, shallow impressions near the latch that don’t belong. They’re subtle enough that I might have missed them under different circumstances.
My stomach clenches in response. I step back into the hallway without touching the handle, my pulse quickening as I take in the rest of the scene. The carpet lies flat. The lights hum softly overhead. No obvious disturbance.
I reach for my phone. Ethan answers on the second ring.
“Ro?” His voice reaches me over the faint echo of movement, radios, and engines in the background. “You okay?”
“I’m at my apartment,” I answer, keeping my tone calm. “The door shows signs of tampering. I didn’t go inside.”
“Stay put,” he instructs firmly. “I’m ten minutes out.”
True to his word, Ethan arrives quickly, his EMT jacket unzipped, his radio clipped to his belt, and the keys jingling softly as he approaches. He looks me over quickly before his attention goes to the door.
“Did you touch it?” he asks.
“No,” I assure him.
“Good.”
He positions himself between me and the door without thinking, his body language automatic and protective. I feel the familiar mix of comfort and guilt that always surfaces when he does this. He shouldn’t have to.
He checks the lock, the frame, and the windows in a methodical way I recognize from my own work. His hands trail along surfaces, his eyes scanning for signs of entry.
“Nothing obvious,” he reports after a moment.
“That’s my concern.”
We step inside together, his presence filling the space. The apartment looks exactly as I left it. Shoes aligned. Counters clear. Nothing missing or disturbed. But that doesn’t reassure me.
Ethan notices the tension in my shoulders and the way my eyes scan every corner.
“You want to tell me what started this?” he asks, leaning against the counter and folding his arms.
I pull the note from my pocket and hand it to him without commentary. He reads it once, then again, his back teeth clenching.
“I don’t like this,” he mutters.
“Neither do I.”
“Someone’s watching you,” he continues, his eyes lifting to mine.
Ethan drags a hand over his face, then starts moving through the apartment, adjusting objects that were already in place.
He does it without thinking, his tall frame filling the narrow space as he passes.
His sandy-brown hair falls loosely across his forehead, and the familiar tattoo on his forearm flashes into view as he reaches for the window latch.
He looks older than twenty-five in moments like this, his jaw set and shoulders squared.
I recognize the behavior immediately. He manages tension by doing, not by standing still.
“I had a rough call today,” he remarks, as if testing the ground. “Kid fell off scaffolding. No harness. He’s lucky to be alive.”
“Lucky is relative,” I reply quietly.
He nods, a shadow crossing his face. “Dad would have hated that job site.”
“Yes,” I agree. “Too many shortcuts. Too much risk for no reason.”
We go quiet for a moment, the history between us present without needing explanation.
Ethan ended up in emergency medicine after our father died, drawn by the same instinct at seven years old that pushed me toward trauma surgery when I was twelve.
We took different paths into the same kind of work, but we were both shaped by the same loss and the need to do something useful with it.
“Lila doesn’t think I’m overreacting about the note,” I add after a moment. I keep my tone casual, but my fingers curl briefly against my palms before I relax them.
Ethan pauses what he’s doing and looks at me fully then, his blue-green eyes moving from the apartment to my face. “And what do you think?”
“I think I might be reading too much into it. A note isn’t a threat. Marks on a door don’t automatically mean intent. I spend my days looking for worst-case scenarios. It’s possible I’m applying that lens where it doesn’t belong.”
He studies me, his focus attentive rather than doubtful. “That’s you trying to talk yourself out of your instincts.”
I shake my head slightly. “That’s me trying not to escalate this before I understand what I’m dealing with. I don’t want to assume a motive when there could be a simpler explanation.”
“Does that explanation include someone knowing where you work and how you move through your day?” he asks quietly.
I don’t answer right away.
“That’s the part I can’t explain,” I admit. “The placement and timing. It feels intentional, but feelings aren’t proof.”
Ethan exhales through his nose and leans back against the counter, his arms crossing over his chest. “Ro, paranoia is when there’s nothing there and you build a story anyway. This isn’t that. There’s something there. You’re just holding off on labeling it.”
“I don’t want to assume anything,” I say. “I don’t want to turn this into something bigger by reacting the wrong way.”
Ethan nods once. “I have to head in soon,” he says. “Overnight shift.”
“Okay.”
He pushes off the counter and steps closer, lowering his voice. “You’re not overreacting. You’re assessing. That’s different. If anything changes, you call me.”
“I will.”
“And Ro,” he adds, holding my gaze. “Trust that thing in you that notices details. It’s kept you alive more than once.”
The acknowledgment lodges in my chest.
He squeezes my shoulder once before stepping back, already in work mode, though his attention stays on me a second longer before he heads for the door.
“I’ll check in,” he promises. “If anything feels off, you call me. I don’t care what time it is.”
“Okay.”
He hesitates near the door, then steps forward and pulls me into a firm embrace. I rest my forehead briefly against his shoulder, breathing in the familiar scent of soap and cold air.
“Lock up,” he instructs softly. “All of it.”
“Don’t worry, I will.”
After he leaves, the apartment goes quiet in a way that feels noticeable rather than calm.
I lock the door, set the chain, and pause there for a moment.
I move through the rooms methodically, rechecking locks even though I watched Ethan secure them.
The chain is tight. The windows are latched.
The balcony door resists when I test it.
Everything appears intact. But that doesn’t guarantee safety.
I switch on lamps instead of the overhead lights, creating pools of soft illumination that leave fewer blind spots. My shoes come off by the door out of habit, but I don’t line them up. The deviation stands out, a small fracture in my routine that reflects the larger one under my skin.
I wash my hands, scrubbing until sensation overtakes thought, the water hot enough to sting. I dry my hands and leave the towel crumpled instead of folding it. Another deviation.
I change into a soft cotton shirt and sit on the edge of my bed without turning on the television or music. I want to hear everything. The hum of the refrigerator, the distant murmur of traffic, a door closing somewhere down the hall. Normal sounds that should calm me, but don’t.
The note remains in my pocket like a pulse I can’t ignore. I take it out again, smoothing the fold with my thumb as I read it once more. No signature. No explicit threat. Just the suggestion that someone is watching me. Knows my routines well enough to enter my workspace and leave without notice.
My mind runs through possibilities. A patient. A colleague. Someone connected to Alexei Morozov. Someone connected to Kiren Sovarin.
That last thought sends a shiver up my spine.
I consider what I’ve already told Ethan and what I’ve withheld.
I didn’t mention Kiren by name. I didn’t mention the alley, or the way his presence has threaded itself through my thoughts with unsettling persistence.
Not because I trust Kiren. Because he represents a variable I don’t yet understand.
The memory of Alexei surfaces again, his grip on my wrist, and the urgency in his eyes. Betrayal inside. Names without context. Warnings delivered to a stranger because there was no one else left.
I stay where I am, my spine straight, and my feet planted on the floor.
I won’t let fear take hold. Instead, I make an assessment.
If someone is watching me, then patterns matter.
If someone left that note, then timing matters.
If Alexei’s words connect to this at all, then I’m already involved whether I want to be or not.
Avoidance won’t protect me, but information might.
I pick up my phone and open my messages, scrolling through threads without seeing them. My thumb pauses when I reach Kiren’s name, the contact information sparse, saved without embellishment. No photo. No notes. Just a name and a number.
I don’t think of the next step as reaching out for help. That would imply reliance I’m not prepared for. Instead, I think of it as clarification.
I draw a slow breath, allowing my hands to still before I initiate the call. The line rings once. Twice. He answers before the third.
“Rowan,” his voice comes through low and curious, the faint trace of an accent giving it definition. “Either you miss me already, or you’re calling to request a second dinner.”
“Neither,” I reply, keeping my tone level. “I need to meet with you.”
A pause follows, short but attentive. “Tonight?”
“No,” I correct. “Soon. In person. To talk.”
Another pause, longer this time. I hear him consider it.
“This doesn’t sound social,” he observes.
“It isn’t.”
“And you aren’t telling me why,” he observes.
“Not over the phone.”
The silence lingers, deliberate rather than uncomfortable.
“Somewhere public?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll make myself available,” he replies. “When and where?”
“I’ll let you know.”
The line goes quiet for a heartbeat before he speaks again. “Rowan.”
“Yes?”
“If this conversation were optional,” he says, “you wouldn’t be calling.”
“No.”
There’s a brief pause. “Then we shouldn’t delay.”
I lower the phone, my pulse elevated. The apartment remains quiet, yet everything feels different. Whatever world Kiren Sovarin inhabits has already reached into mine. And I won’t pretend his presence hasn’t started to matter.