“We’d like to take your statements,” the stocky officer said as he came up behind Cam and me.
By the time we both gave our statement and Roxie finished answering questions, it was really late and I was exhausted. Roxie was pale, had dark circles under her eyes, and when she lifted her water to her lips, her hands shook.
“You should go to bed,” I told her, handing her a bottle of Motrin to go with her water.
“I’m not sure I’ll be able to sleep.”
“I’m staying tonight,” Cam told her. “You girls won’t be alone.”
She nodded.
“I’m staying too,” Adam announced.
Roxie and I both turned to look at him. “You’re going to sleep here tonight?” I asked.
He nodded. “I’ll take the couch.” He glanced at Roxie. “Just in case anyone needs anything.”
Roxie visibly relaxed at Adam’s announcement, so I figured it was a good idea. I found a couple extra blankets and Roxie gave him a pillow off her bed. Cam and I said goodnight as Adam was using his phone to check in at the club.
After I washed my face and brushed my teeth, I went into the bedroom to change. I tossed my dirty clothes in my laundry basket and pulled on a pair of striped boxers and a purple tank top. Cam was in the bathroom, and I waited for him by going to my vanity and picking up my brush, running it over my hair and smiling at the glimpse of the reflection of the bracelet Cam gave me.
Tonight had been so wonderful. Not even all the bad stuff that happened since we got home could take away all the giddiness I felt about my first official date with Cam.
After all the tangles in my hair were gone and it was shining around my shoulders, I set down the brush.
Something caught my eye.
There on the vanity near my brush, propped in front of the mirror, was my sea glass barrette.
The one that was stolen earlier today.
My stomach churned and my palms became slick with nervous sweat.
I knew then the reason nothing, besides Roxie, was disturbed tonight when someone broke into this house.
They weren’t here to steal anything.
They came to leave something behind.
The next couple days went by in a blur. I walked around on autopilot, going to work, making snow cones, dancing (let’s face it, I would never be a great stripper), and serving drinks at the Mad Hatter. In between all that, Roxie and I obsessively checked the locks on the door and stared out into the shadows of the parking lot at night.
I questioned Roxie again about the man who muscled his way into our home, and she seemed very convinced it was Craig. Both of us were waiting on pins and needles to hear what the police would tell us after they paid him a visit.
Shouldn’t they have done that by now?
Shouldn’t we have heard something?
Did it really matter? Because the more I thought, the more I obsessed, the more I began to think that it wasn’t Craig. I was beginning to think that Roxie’s visitor was meant for me.
But that seemed crazy, so crazy that I hadn’t confided my fears to anyone. Why would someone come after me? I was a broke college student who spent all her time working. Sure, I had friends, but no one I really hung out with. My roommate had been the only person I spent time with outside of school, and she moved to another state last month to get a job with her shiny new bachelor’s degree.
It was the reason I was so happy to have met Roxie. She seemed like good friend material. And Cam… Cam was perfect boyfriend material. Not that we were official or anything. We hadn’t really had time to have the “talk.” Plus, it was all still pretty new. There was no reason to rush things. Yeah, okay, some people might say we rushed things already by having sex so fast, but the way I see it is I’m twenty-one years old, a woman. I go to school, work two jobs, and take care of myself. Cam makes me feel things I never have before. My body practically purrs whenever he’s near. His touch scrambles my thoughts and turns me into Jell-O. I might not love him (not yet anyway), but I was old enough to make my own decisions.
I was beyond thrilled when my shift at the snow cone cart was finished and I could go home. I spent most of the day zoning about the barrette and searching the crowds for faces that I might recognize or for a stranger who seemed intrigued by me.
I was tired. Neither Roxie nor I had been sleeping well, and I secretly missed Cam. It seemed silly because spending just two nights in his arms was enough to make me reach for him in the middle of night.
As I trudged through the heat toward the parking lot, someone grabbed me from behind and I stiffened, a shriek clawing its way out of my throat as I prepared to scream and kick.
“Harlow, it’s me,” Cam said, releasing me and stepping back. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I called out your name.”
I spun around and launched myself at him, hugging him hard around the waist. “I’m sorry, I must not have heard you.”
“You okay?” he asked, looking down. “Are you still upset about the other night?” He brushed a finger beneath my eye where they were no doubt shadowed with dark circles.
I shrugged.
“Talk to me.”
“I didn’t know you were coming to see me today,” I said, changing the subject.
“I finished up the board I was working on this afternoon and figured I’d come see my girl.”
I knew it was just an expression, but every time he called me his girl, or sweetheart, something inside me melted just a little bit more. “I’m glad you came.”
He leaned down and kissed me. His kiss was like a really good book or movie. It completely transported me to another place. It took me out of my own head, and I did nothing but get lost in him.
“I needed that,” I murmured when he lifted his head.
“You need ice cream too.”
“I do?”
He nodded and draped an arm across my shoulders, fitting me alongside his body and steering me toward Ben and Jerry’s. He ordered a massive serving of Phish Food (chocolate ice cream swirled with gooey marshmallow and caramel with fudge fish) swimming inside a giant waffle bowl. I had no idea where he was going to put it all, but it was definitely going to be interesting to watch. I ordered a scoop of chocolate mint crunch in a regular-sized cone and then we sat in the corner of the scoop shop at a tiny round table.
“Seriously, how are you going to eat that?” I mused, watching him shovel a huge bite of the sweet treat into his mouth.
“It’s Phish Food,” he declared like that somehow explained everything. Then he scooped up a fudge fish and held the spoon to my lips.
I opened my mouth and he slid the spoon between my teeth and then pulled it back, my lips dragging across the cold plastic as he pulled. His eyes darkened as he watched my mouth move.
When the spoon was gone, I pulled up my cone and started licking across the top and around the edges.
“Are you trying to kill me?” he asked, leaning over the table, his eyes still on my mouth.
“Definitely not.” I held the cone out to him and he licked up the side of it slowly. After he swallowed, he lowered his voice and leaned even closer. “You taste better.”
I wagged my eyebrows at him and he chuckled.
He looked so good today with a navy-blue baseball hat turned backward covering up his blond hair, rocking the beachy tan that never went away, and wearing a white T-shirt with a pair of navy-blue board shorts with a wide gray stripe down each side.
“Have you gotten any sleep the last couple days?”
I nodded. “Some.”
“Have you heard from the cops?”
“No,” I said, frowning. “I really thought they would have said something to Roxie by now.”
“What else is bothering you?” he asked, studying me.
“How do you know there’s something else?”
“I can see it in your eyes. You’ve been kind of quiet since the other night. What’s bothering you?”
Someone bumped into our table and I jumped back.
Cam frowned. “Come on, let’s go somewhere else to talk.”
We went to the beach, both of us discarding our shoes to the back seat of my car and taking our ice cream to walk onto the sand and wander along the water’s edge. The heat was more bearable here because of the strong wind that came off the waves.
“This is going to sound crazy,” I said as we walked. “But I’m starting to worry that it wasn’t Craig the other night.”
“Who do you think it was?”
“I don’t know. But I have this bad feeling they were after me.”
His hand found mine and linked us together. “Explain.”
“You know the barrette I lost, the one someone took off the cart the other day?”
He nodded.
“It was in my bedroom.”
His steps faltered. “So you just misplaced it?”
“No. I had it at work that day. It’s the only barrette I have like that. Someone took it… and then it turned up in my bedroom.”
He stopped walking altogether and pulled me around so we were standing in the waves, facing each other.
“You think the person in your apartment the other night broke in to leave something there?”
“I know it sounds crazy.”
His fingers tightened around mine. “I believe you.”
“You do?”
“I’m on your side. I’ll always believe you.”
I don’t know why, but tears pricked the backs of my eyes. I blinked furiously, trying to make them go away. Cam took my melting ice cream cone and put it inside his half-eaten waffle bowl, setting them both in the sand.
He pulled me into his arms, wrapping them both around me, holding me close and resting his chin atop my head. “Why didn’t you say something sooner, sweetheart?”
“At first I thought I was just being irrational. But the more I think about it…”
“There’s more?”
I nodded. He sighed and bent to pick up the now waterlogged ice cream and jogged over to throw it in a nearby trash can. Then we sat on the sand.
“Roxie took my car that night,” I began. “She and I have similar looks… Both of us have long dark hair. We’re both curvy…”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying what if someone was watching the house that night, waiting for me to come home? She pulled up in my car. From a distance and in the dark, someone could mistake her for me.”
“Okay, I could see that,” he said slowly. Tension began to radiate from his body and that’s when I knew for sure I wasn’t just being paranoid. This was a real possibility.
“But there’s still that jerk Craig. He isn’t exactly a boy scout.” Cam continued.
“Roxie all but admitted that he was violent with her in the past.”
“There is a possibility it was actually Craig, you know.”
“Yeah, I know.” I said it softly and the wind took my words and carried them away.
“But you’re scared.” His arm went around my waist, his fingers splaying out across my belly. He slid my body into his side and I leaned my head on his chest.
I sighed. I could sit like this—curled into his side—all day. “Maybe a little.”
“It’s okay to be scared,” he told me. “It doesn’t make you weak. It makes you smart.”
“How does being scared make me smart?”
“Because it’s your body and mind’s way of protecting itself. Your brain is telling you something’s wrong. Ignoring that feeling will only put you in danger and possibly cause you to miss things that could potentially save your life.”
I tipped back my head. “You’re a smart guy, Cam.”
“I know.”
I grinned. “So modest too.”
“That’s me, babe. Modest and smart and extremely good-looking.”
“Did I say you were extremely good-looking?”
“You didn’t have to. Your eyes say it all.”
“You’re okay I guess,” I said playfully.
He let go of my waist and began feeling around my head.
“What are you doing?”
“Checking to see if that bump is still there. I think it damaged your mind when you fell.”