Page 52 of Corrupting Ivy

I tucked a stray lock of hair behind my ear. “Um. It’s been a long time since I was on the internet, and I wanted to check something. Forget it. It’s okay.” I bit my lip and stared at the dryer, hoping it would release the weight of his hard gaze.

Out of my periphery, Randall dug his hand into his pocket and unlocked his screen with his thumbprint. Have I been living under a rock? I didn’t know phones could do that. He passed his fingers around the screen, tapping, then handed it to me. “I use this for business, so don’t stray.”

I shook my head with tight lips. “I won’t.” Taking the thin black phone from his hands, I stared at it as though it were a precious commodity. How pathetic. I’d never had a smartphone before, always the flip phones. Greenville had very little cell phone coverage in town and even the surrounding areas, so we had prepaid plans and no need for the up-to-date gadgets. “Thank you.”

“Hmhm.”

He returned to his tablet. What would be the correct way to phrase it? I stared at the search engine logo, then typed.Mayor Jeremiah Baker brother's death. The slow search brought up results of law cases and obituaries, all of which for people I wasn’t looking for.Greenville, Montana obituary.

The dryer buzzed as I pressed the search button. A rotating circle spun in the middle of the screen, waiting for the results to drop. Randall’s dryer buzzed. Dammit. I pushed the button on the side, turning off the screen, then handed it back to him. “Thanks.”

I dropped my clothes into my bag from the dryer, catching sight of the attendant when I bent down. Her cheeks burned bright red as she held her book up, changing the pages. I smiled.Hmm. Can’t imagine what she’s reading about.

“What’s going on in that head of yours?”

I turned to Randall as he opened his dryer.

“Nothing.”

He grunted, then threw his clothes into his bag, the same as me, not bothering to fold them, then tossed the bag to the chair. I couldn’t stand folding my clothes where people could watch me. It made me feel weird.

“When did you notice this person following you?”

Pulling the strings on the bag, I lifted to the chair I sat in. “I think you need another tattoo that warns people of your randomness.” Randall stared at me as he leaned against the machines and folded his arms across his chest. Each muscle in his forearms and biceps flexed as I waited for a response. I sighed. Guess that wasn’t as funny as I thought.

“Well, I thought maybe it was Otis. You know, the man you sat next to this morning. He was the one who found me when I fell. But then he went off to compete in the rodeo a few towns away when I saw the man for the second time. He just stood on the corner of the street under a light post. He wasn’t afraid of being seen.” I moved around the strings in my bag. “You know,” I looked at my hands, then back up at him, “I swear that he even looked up at me when I saw him. It was like he knew I was watching him, and he wanted me to know that.”

Shivers raced through my body, prickling my skin as I told him. I didn’t get any sleep that night. I just kept staring at the door, waiting for him to barge through it.

“Did you tell the Sheriff?”

“Yeah. He came and looked around, but he left before the deputy got there.” Which is quite impressive, given their response time in this town. “Ready to go?”

I followed Randall out the door and placed my bag in the backseat, then hopped inside. Johnny Cash’s dark, warm voice flowed through the speakers when he turned on the truck. I leaned against the headrest and placed my hand on my chest, and sighed. I love Johnny Cash, but it brought in a flood of terrible memories along with it. Sometimes, when I needed to just mourn the loss of everything I’d ever known, but the tears wouldn’t come, I’d play “Like the 309” and the dam would burst. I could cry for hours while listening to him.

We drove back, country music in the background. We listened to Gabby Barrett’s sweet hope of revenge against her ex, and I couldn’t help but smile.

Randall pulled the truck up to the sidewalk next to my stairs. The smell of bacon sandwiches and French fries rode in on the cool AC air, causing my stomach to grumble. I’d only eaten a piece of toast all day, and my stomach was fighting mad about it.

My stomach fluttered all the way to my door, with Randall on my heels carrying the laundry bags. There was something about this moment that felt oddly domestic. But he didn’t seem like the settling down type. Randall dropped the bags on the steps and placed his hand on my waist, halting me from taking another step. He pressed my back to the wall, placed his finger to his lips, then shushed me.

“Wait,” he whispered.

The door. He’d noticed it cracked open well before I did. Maybe because my head was in the clouds thinking about food and him.

He pulled the knife from his back, reminding me of the night he went after my stalker with no thoughts for safety, then pushed the door in until it slammed flat against the wall. If there was a person hiding behind that door, he would’ve smashed them with a doorknob to the gut. I kept my back flat against the wall, hoping it would absorb me like camouflage. My heart raced like a pack of wild dogs chasing a rabbit while he checked my apartment.

Randall stepped outside, sheathing his knife, then ushered me inside as he picked up the bags, his head turning in all directions.

“Maybe I forgot to lock it up?”

“I was the last out the door, I locked the handle.”

I stepped inside and kicked off my shoes as he threw my bag on the bed; the contents spilling onto the mattress. “Nothing appears to be taken.”

“It’s a game. Just like the rest.”

“I don’t know. It's just… why now?”

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