Chapter Ninety
Ruby
The sound wakes me instantly. A sharp crack. Then the violent shatter of glass. For half a second, my brain can’t place it. Another crash echoes through the house.
I bolt upright. Beside me, Xavier is already moving. “What was that?”
His feet hit the floor. “Stay here.”
Stay here? Alone? That’s not going to happen. I scramble off the bed, catching the sheet around my feet and stumbling to an upright position. “I’m going with you.”
Xavier groans and shakes his head. “Fine, stay behind me.”
Another impact slams through the front of the house. Glass scatters across hardwood somewhere down the hallway. My heart lurches. “That was inside.”
Okay, I may want to stay here. My fingers shake as I snatch my silk robe off the dresser.
“I know.” He grabs the flashlight from the nightstand and strides for the bedroom door.
No. My spine straightens. This is my house. My home. And no one is going to scare me out of it.
I’m behind him before he can say anything else. He doesn’t argue.
The living room is chaos. Glass litters the floor beneath the front window, cold air pouring through the jagged hole punched through the center. The curtains move in the wind.
Xavier crouches, flashlight sweeping the room. A rock sits in the middle of the broken glass. Paper taped around it.
“Son of a bitch.” He picks it up, peeling the tape back. The muscles in his jaw flex once.
“What does it say?” Acid burns in my throat.
He hesitates just long enough for my pulse to spike before turning it toward me.
Stay away from her.
Cold settles low in my stomach. The broken window lets another gust of air into the room.
Xavier is already moving. Not toward the door. Toward me. His hand finds my arm, guiding me back from the window. "Stay here."
“What?”
Another sharp crack echoes outside. Farther away this time, but still close. Too close.
He kills the flashlight. The room drops into darkness. Only the porch light spills through the broken window. He stands just off to one side of it, careful not to silhouette himself. Watching. Listening.
The flashlight stays off. His gaze sweeps the yard. Fence line. Driveway. Tree line. I inch closer while remaining out of view, following the same scanning motion. Nothing. No movement. No footsteps. No engine. Just the wind.
Another few seconds pass. Too quiet.
He speaks without looking away. ‘If somebody’s out there, they’re waiting for one of us to make a mistake.”
The words cause the hair on my arms to stand. He waits. Five seconds. Ten. Nothing. Only then does he unlock the front door. He eases it open a few inches.
Stops. Listens again. Then steps onto the porch. Not far. Just enough to clear the doorway.
The flashlight clicks on. Its beam sweeps the yard in slow arcs. Driveway. Fence. Tree line. Truck.
He freezes. “Jesus...”
“What?”
I stay inside exactly where he left me.
His light settles on the truck. The rear windshield has exploded inward. Glass blankets the back seat. A rock lies beside the tire. Something white is taped around it.
He scans the yard one more time before crossing to it and never taking the same angle twice. Only after another slow sweep does he crouch and pick up the note.
“What does it say?”
He doesn’t answer. Instead, he walks back to the porch before handing it to me.
She doesn’t want you.
Something tightens painfully in my chest. Not because I believe it. Because whoever did this wants him gone badly enough to stand in the dark outside my house throwing rocks through windows.
My hands start shaking. Not subtle. Not controllable.
“Hey.” His hand settles against the back of my neck, grounding. “Breathe. It’s going to be fine. I’m here. No one is going to get to you.”
“Okay.” I try. The frigid air burns going down as I bite my bottom lip to keep it from trembling.
“This time, we’ve got them.”
With his free hand, Xavier lifts the flashlight toward the corner of the house. And he goes still again. The camera hangs crooked beneath the roofline. Broken. The lens smashed inward.
“Oh, my God.”
He swings the light toward the backyard. The second camera is dark too. Destroyed. Whoever did this got close enough to hit both of them. Close enough to stand under the corners of the house while we slept.
“The fucking bastard.” His voice is flat. Controlled in a way that I’ve never heard before. The flashlight sweeps the tree line again. Nothing moves—no sound except the wind brushing through the trees and the faint rustle from the pig pen. Long gone.
But they were here. In the yard. Stalking me. Destroying my property. Xavier’s property. Threatening us.
Xavier turns back toward the house. “We’re leaving.”
I don’t argue. Not even a little. “What about the pigs?”
“I’ll come back in the morning.”
The broken window creaks behind us as another gust pushes through the shattered glass. I look back at the house—the jagged hole in the front window. The glass scattered across my hardwood floor. The curtains stirring in the cold air.
This is home. Or... It was. A few hours ago, these walls felt solid. Safe. Now all I see is how easy it was. One rock. One window. One step closer.
The note in my hands. Xavier's truck. The shattered glass glittering across the back seat. The messages weren't meant to scare me anymore. They were meant to convince me there was nowhere left to hide.
Something tightens deep in my chest. Not panic. Not yet. Something colder. The certainty that whoever's doing this isn't going away. They're getting bolder. More confident.
Xavier grabs my hand. “Pack a bag.”
My fingers curl around his. He starts toward the door, already thinking three steps ahead, already moving into fix-it mode. Locks. Truck. Windows. What comes next.
I look once more toward the edge of the property. The fence line. The dark beyond it. Nothing there. But for the first time since this started, I don’t feel watched.
I feel hunted.