Authors: Dara England
Teagan grimaced and silenced the thought. Suddenly developing a headache of enormous proportions, she sat down, dragged off her boots, and collapsed into bed. All she needed was a little sleep. Maybe when she woke again the world would make a little more sense.
* * * *
It was the middle of the night and Teagan was deep into her dreams when an insistent thumping, rattling noise jarred her awake. Crawling upright in bed, she stared, heart thundering, toward the flimsy door that was the lone entrance or exit from her apartment. What was going on out there? Surely someone with nothing to hide would call out for her to open up, rather than assaulting her door? It was dark, but she could just make out the outline of the doorway by the lines of pale light filtering around its edges from the stairwell beyond. The thumping noise at the other side of the door continued and Teagan thought, through the darkness, she could see the door’s knob turning as someone attempted to shake it open.
There was no time to think. She leapt out of bed and flicked on her lights, making as much noise as possible during the process. Scanning her small apartment for a likely weapon, she grabbed up the same pair of scissors from her nightstand she had used the other day when snipping the clipping of Sir from the newspaper. The realization gave her pause, as the knocking on the door fell silent. Was it Sir standing on the other side? That seemed unlikely. Sir would be calling her name, wouldn’t he?
During the long, breathless moments that eased out as she stood behind the door, straining her ears to pick up another sound and tightly gripping the cold metal scissors in her hand, nothing stirred. Not Teagan. Not the unknown person on the other side of the door. As the minutes ticked by and it began to grow clear the would-be intruder had moved on, Teagan warred with herself, trying to build up the courage to fling the door open. She never did.
The early hours of the morning found her propped in an armchair opposite the door, the pair of scissors resting nearby, and her eyes still fixed on the doorway. Her level of alertness had faded by this time, and once or twice she thought she had nodded off for a few minutes during the night. Morning, however, brought with it a new courage.
When the numbers on the clock beside her bed flipped to a six and two zeros, Teagan knew it was time. She couldn’t stay holed up in this lonely room forever, and calling for her landlord would have been equally ridiculous when the only explanation she could give for her panic was that someone had tried to get into her room. It sounded like a foolish dream now. Who would take her seriously?
Thoughts like these accompanied her as she crossed the floor, only to hesitate before the door. Pressing one ear against the side, she made out no noise from beyond. Unlocking the bolt, but leaving the chain in place, she cracked the door just enough to peer out into the stairwell. Her wary watch told her nothing. The empty corridor and the stairs above it seemed to be empty. On a sudden flare of courage, she slipped the chain and threw the door wide open.
Despite the wild pounding of her heart, nothing happened. She was alone at the foot of the stairs. Nothing around her seemed to be out of place. But one thing had been added to her view. A small, white envelope lay on the floor at her feet. She picked it up.
Back inside the safety of her room, with the door once more bolted behind her, Teagan sat down and laid the envelope on the table before her. It was plain, unmarked. There was not even any indication on the front for whom it was intended. But Teagan knew. It had been left outside her door—left by someone who had tried, but failed, to get in last night.
After a long moment of studying the envelope as if it were some more frightening object than a plain bit of folded paper held together with glue, she decided it wasn’t going to open itself. Why did the simple act of tearing it open set her hands to shaking like this?
Delving inside, Teagan’s searching fingertips found a single scrap of paper, folded in half. Slipping the note out, she unfolded it and smoothed it across the tabletop. The short line of scrawl stood out in black ink against the pale paper, but the hand that penned it had apparently been far from steady, so that the letters crowded together, making them difficult to discern. Eventually, Teagan deciphered the brief message:
Ms. Teagan Grant,
You don’t know me, but I need to meet with you on a matter of importance. I believe you are in danger
.
That was all. Just two tiny sentences on a piece of paper. But they were enough to freeze Teagan’s blood.
Chapter 19
After the rattling experience with the mysterious note, it was no wonder the next time her door was rapped on a short time later, Teagan nearly leapt out of her shoes. As it turned out, it was only the arrival of a dozen boxes of clothes, the promised attire purchased by Sir for her debut before his grandfather tonight.
Though she would have ordinarily been excited by the famous store names stamped across the tops of the packages, Teagan was still too disturbed by the happenings of the night before to summon enough enthusiasm even to open the lids of most of them.
Except for the shoe boxes. Curiosity prompted her to peek into those to find out why there were so many. It appeared her vagueness on shoe size had prompted Sir to order her the same design of heels in several sizes. She suspected he enjoyed yet another opportunity to prove expense was of no concern to him.
Well, she was in no mood to be overawed by his generosity today, especially when all of this was being carried out for his own deceptive purposes anyway. She had more important matters on her mind this morning than helping Sir carry off his elaborate farce to gain his way back into his grandfather’s good graces. As soon as the delivery man had departed, she snatched up her jacket and dragged on a pair of clunky boots. She needed some air.
Before leaving the warmth of her apartment, she paused and cast a final glance back around her room. After last night, the crowded little space suddenly seemed less safe and cozy than it once had. Her eyes drifted toward the bed against the wall where she had hidden the mysterious note under the sagging mattress. Then, biting her lip, she slammed the door shut.
Outside, she quickly discovered she hadn’t chosen the best of times for her morning stroll. The sky was gray and the low flying clouds looked ominous. By the icy chill in the air, Teagan wouldn’t be surprised if the city saw another coat of snow by nightfall or maybe even a barrage of sleet. She wondered what that would do to Sir’s plans for this evening, and then decided it wasn’t her problem. She was growing less and less certain about his scheme the longer she considered it anyway.
A quiet amble through the nearby park would give her time to put her thoughts in order. She cut across the street and passed between a pair of tall gates leading into the neighborhood dog park. It was a place she knew well, having spent her share of nights sleeping under its benches.
The walkways here were less crowded than usual, probably due to the bad weather, but there were still a handful of hardy souls bundled up tight in their winter wear to brave the cold with their canine companions. Teagan kept a cautious eye on the other passersby, but was relieved to see no sign of a blue coat anywhere among them. Maybe her strange stalker was also being kept indoors by the cold.
She let her guard down long enough to sink back into her thoughts. Had the blue-coated man been the one to leave her the message? It didn’t make sense for him to stalk her one minute and warn her against danger the next. As far as Teagan was concerned, any danger to be had was most likely to come from his direction.
And yet she could think of no one else who would give her such a warning. Sir? Surely not. It wasn’t his style. If he had anything to say to her, he said it to her face, not by way of a cowardly anonymous note. But the most disturbing part of it all was the vagueness of the message. In danger from what? Or whom? That question plagued her more than the mystery of the note’s sender.
She was entering a lonelier part of the park now, a space briefly concealed by overhanging trees, blotting the other intersecting paths from her sight. The unsettling direction of her thoughts caused her to quicken her pace a little, eager to get back to a more peopled location. Even as she berated herself for her lively imagination, her ears picked up the distant sound of approaching footsteps from behind.
It was probably nothing. Just some innocent old lady with her dog on a leash. Yet the tread sounded heavy, brisker than that of an old woman and there wasn’t the accompanying click of a dog’s claws on the pavement. Teagan couldn’t explain what creeping fear made her reluctant to glance back over her shoulder to identify the other person. As an experiment, she rejected her first instinct to break into a trot, and slowed her walk. Behind her, the other walker slowed as well. Speeding her steps again brought the same result.
The trees were growing thicker here on either side of the path, and the safety of the park gate was now lost entirely from view. She longed for a jogger or a kid on a pair of rollerblades to speed by. Anything. But the walkway was empty, except for her presence and that of her lone pursuer.
Despite her fear, a spark of anger also stirred within Teagan. What right did anyone have to stalk her in this way? If it was all some sort of joke, the trailing and the messages, the instigator deserved to be given a piece of her mind. And if it wasn’t… If it wasn’t, she could at least learn what was going on.
Indignation spurring her to boldness, Teagan came to an abrupt halt, whirling on her heel so quickly she nearly stumbled. Behind her, or rather before her now, her follower also skidded to a sudden stop. Teagan was unsurprised to note the blue coat covering the scrawny figure she remembered from yesterday in Sir’s office and from the occasion before that.
Heart hammering, she nonetheless stood her ground. “Why are you following me?” she demanded wildly of the stranger.
He hesitated a short distance away, apparently undecided on whether he should proceed or turn and run away. The realization he was as nervous at confronting her as she was of being approached by him went a little way toward easing Teagan’s fright. If he made a menacing move, she determined, she would cast aside her courage and run.
As it was, her demand was met with empty silence. The stranger seemed to withdraw further into the raised hood of his coat, so that his features remained shadowy and indistinct. As Teagan awaited his response, he took an uncertain step closer.
Teagan swiftly threw up a hand. “Don’t come any closer. We can talk fine from here.”
It occurred to her belatedly if he had a gun shoved into one of those puffy coat pockets, the precaution wouldn’t do much good. Fortunately, he seemed uninterested in threatening her. If he had any weapons on him, they stayed stowed safely out of sight.
He spoke for the first time, his nasally voice ringing hollowly in the silence. “Look, I don’t mean to scare you. I know this doesn’t look good, but I needed to meet with you and I didn’t know how else to go about it.”
Teagan licked her lips. “How about by announcing your presence and saying hello. That’s what most people do when they want to talk with someone.”
He shifted nervously. “That would have been okay, I guess. I might’ve thought of it, only I’ve never done anything like this before.”
Teagan narrowed her eyes. “Never done anything like what?”
He turned his head to glance around them. “Could we go someplace where we can talk alone?”
She didn’t have to think about that one. “Anything you want to say, you can say now. This is as alone as we get.”
He looked unhappy with the response. “I tell you, I’m just trying to help. I want to save you, if I can.”
“Save me from what?”
Again with that over-the-shoulder glance. What was he so afraid of? When he spoke again, his voice had dropped so low she could barely make it out over the distance. “I believe your life is in danger.”
Teagan drew a breath. “Then it was you who left the note outside my door,” she accused. Barely aware of what she did, she inched closer. She was near enough to see his face now, ducked back within his hood. She had a shadowy impression of pale eyebrows and round, gray eyes that were all but hidden behind thick-lensed glasses. It was difficult to put an age to his sunken face, but she thought he was in his middle years. He looked like an accountant or a postal employee. Certainly there was nothing out of the ordinary about him, nothing that said stalker. Unless she counted the awkward way he averted his gaze and the nervous way his hands twitched as they hung limply at his sides.
“I did leave a message,” he admitted now. “I was desperate to talk to you and I couldn’t get past your door. Don’t you see? The more time slips by, the faster I run out of options.”
An odd look—almost a crazed glint—had come into his eyes, unnerving Teagan so that, as he tried to approach her, she quickly widened the distance between them again.
“Please,” he grated, looking at once angry and frustrated. “I’ve told you, my only thought is to protect you.”
Teagan cast an anxious glance over her shoulder, looking for an escape route. If she broke into a run, would he follow her?
“Protect me from what?” She asked the question more to distract him than anything.
But his next words captured her full attention. “From your friend, Mr. Rotham.”
Chapter 20
There was such obvious hatred in his tone as he spoke Sir’s name, Teagan shivered. Trying to fight through her confusion, she said, “I—I don’t know what you’re talking about. Mr. Rotham is no friend of mine.”
“And yet you spend nights in his apartment.”
The implication of his cool words sent a chill through her. How long had he been following her? Watching her every move? How many nights had he followed her back and forth from Sir’s apartment?
She heard her mouth speak the words before she was aware her mind had framed a response. “What is that to you? How do you know so much about me?”