Page 27 of Reckless Flames

The day began with a deceptive calm, the kind that precedes a storm. I’d spent the morning mostly with Caleb, but then I had to make some time to check in with Joe on the status of the renovation and then do the same with the security team I’d brought in to ensure Sophie’s safety.

It was late afternoon when Sophie found me in the study, her presence a welcome distraction from the weight of responsibility that had settled on my shoulders.

“Hey,” she greeted me, her voice a soft melody against the backdrop of my concerns.

I looked up, my heart skipping a beat at the sight of her. She was simply stunning—there were just no two ways about it. “Heyyourself,” I replied, pushing aside the latest batch of the papers that always seemed to litter my desk. “How was your day?”

She shrugged, a noncommittal gesture that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “It was okay. Spent most of it trying to catch up on correspondence. Fan mail, mostly. I just received the letters that had been sent to my publisher which they threw into a box and forwarded to me.”

The mention of fan mail reminded me of the more sinister aspect of her public life, the shadow that had crept so insidiously into our own. “Anything interesting?” I asked carefully.

Sophie hesitated, then nodded, a frown marring her features. “Actually, there were…some letters from the stalker. I know because he’s signed them the same way he signed the email.”

The words sent a chill down my spine, the specter of the stalker suddenly looming large between us. “Show me,” I said, the request coming out more as a demand, my protective instincts kicking into overdrive.

She handed me three letters, her hands trembling slightly. As I skimmed through them, a sense of foreboding grew. The first one he’d written was more weird than threatening, talking about how much the male main character in her book resembled him. He also informed her that he intended to put the date at the top of each letter since she would surely want to save all of his letters and might want to keep them in the order they were written.Judging by the date, that letter was probably his first attempt to contact her after the book signing—if he was that same oddball.

The second one was obsessive, the ramblings of someone clearly fixated on Sophie, and even more disturbing than the first one.

The most recent letter was the worst:

Sophie,

You have disappointed and disobeyed me, my dear, and you will have to be punished for that. Did you really think I wouldn’t find out where you are?

But fear not, we are meant to be together, so the punishment will not be too severe.

Yours very truly,

Don’t you wish you knew?

“Fuck,” I swore under my breath, the implications of the letters sending a wave of anger and fear coursing through me. I couldn’t help but wonder, though, why he had gone back to letters since the one email from him must have been sent during the gapbetween two of the letters. Maybe he didn’t have easy access to a computer.

Sophie’s face paled. “What do we do?”

“We take this to the police,” I said, my voice firm with resolve. “And we increase security. I’m not taking any chances with your safety.”

The moment was tense, fraught with the realization of the danger that lurked so close to the surface of our lives. But it was Sophie who bridged the gap between us, her hand finding mine, a gesture of unity in the face of the threat.

“Thank you, Ben,” she whispered, her voice thick with emotion. “For everything.”

I squeezed her hand, the gesture conveying all the words I couldn’t quite bring myself to say. In that moment, the connection between us was a tangible force, a bond forged in the fires of adversity, unyielding and resolute.

But as we stood there, united in our determination to face whatever lay ahead, the tender moment was overshadowed by the dark cloud of the stalker’s obsession. The discovery of the letters was a stark reminder of the reality we were contending with, a reality that threatened to unravel the fragile peace we’d found in each other’s company.

The rest of the day was a blur of activity: a meeting with the security team plus some things I needed to do to keep my business running. There was also a trip into town to take the letters to Detective Roberts. She agreed with me that the letters had probably been written by our local stalker. Who else could have written that last one mentioning Sophie’s fairly recent move to my house—a letter soon received by her nearby publisher just in time to go into the box to be forwarded? It had to be impossible that there were two lunatics in town fixated on Sophie.

As I lay in bed that night, the events of the day replaying in my mind, I couldn’t shake the feeling of being watched. The stalker’s letters had breached the sanctuary of my home, a violation that felt both personal and profound.

The discovery of those obsessive letters, intertwined so disturbingly with Sophie’s literary work, cast a long, ominous shadow. Each letter was a twisted testament to the dark side of fame, a reminder that her public persona had attracted an unwanted, dangerous form of attention.

As I sat in my office the following morning, surrounded by the unopened fan mail that I had offered to open for her, a grim determination settled over me. I was going to get this guy.

Sophie entered, her eyes shadowed with the weight of recent events. “How do the rest of them look so far?” she asked, her voice trying for optimism but faltering under the strain.

I handed her the letters from fans and others who wanted writing or publishing advice. “These are okay. I’ve still got some to open. Do you actually respond to the people who ask for advice?”

Sophie nodded. “I try to. It’s usually just a few lines, but I like to be helpful if I can,” she said firmly, despite the obvious toll the situation was taking on her.

---