Page 9 of Stalker's Valentine

“I need eyes on her.” He didn’t skip a beat.

“Eyes, how?”

“Oleg—“

“If she doesn’t know she’s yours, I’m guessing it’s not like she’s exactly going to let you walk into her place and let us set up security at her house. A house that… Jesus, Merri! Are you parked in front of her place? What the fuck?—“

“Technically, I’m across the street,” I interrupted. I had no idea how he knew I was where I was, but I didn’t care. I almost would have been disappointed if he hadn’t. He was the best at what he did.

“Merri—" he started to warn. I ran my fingers through my hair.

“I need eyes on her. Inside her place, following her wherever the hell she goes and giving me updates of what she’s up to throughout the day. Detailed updates.” His low whistle had my jaw clenching. I had a bad feeling I wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

“That’s illegal, Merri.”

“And? We both know this isn’t the first time…” I paused to cool down and be a little more delicate in how I phrased shit. “That you might have been hired to do something not completely on the up and up.”

“Completely on the up and up?” he repeated “There is nothing legal about this,” he hissed.

“So, how much?” I asked, and when he gave me the amount, I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t even blink. “Done,” I agreed.

Hell, I would have paid ten times the amount if it meant laying eyes on her at any time of the fucking day.

When we ended the call, I stayed parked across the street for another hour. Watching. Waiting. Hoping to catch a glimpse of her. But when she shut the curtains over the windows that faced the street, I gave up and headed home.

Soon.

Soon, my cutie will be all mine.

scarlett

. . .

I typedaway at my computer like I had been the entire day. Medical billing wasn’t brain surgery, but it could be tedious work. The only plus side was that I was able to work from home to do it.

I stretched and sighed.

“I need a massage,” I muttered under my breath before rolling my neck side to side. I stood up after I finished what I needed to get done before clocking out and walked from my home office to my living room.

I headed towards the windows and looked at the street I had lived on for the last year. It wasn’t the best, but it was hardly the worst. Too cold for the kids who I usually heard to play outside; the streets were empty. Only a couple of parked cars on the sidewalks. I’d grown up in Moonlit Pines, California, but since moving out of my childhood home, I hadn’t really paid attention to where I actually lived. I was kind of a boring person.

“No kind of about it,” I mumbled under my breath. “I am officially the most boring twenty-five-year-old known to man,” I kept talking to myself, reaching for the huge canvas bag I had sitting next to the couch before getting comfortable on myloveseat. “Now I get to be boring and crazy because I talk to myself.” I could have laughed at myself.

I was a little… pathetic.

No, you’re not; you’re just having a moment, a voice in my head encouraged. I breathed in and out slowly, then took my yarn out, along with the hook, and got to work. I was working on crocheting a temperature blanket this year and was determined to try and not get more than two days behind at a time. My phone rang just as I got going, and I was tempted to ignore it. But if I did, I had a feeling one, if not all three of my sisters, would show up out of nowhere. I set my crocheting down and picked up my phone. My eyes rolled as I pressed the answer button.

“Yes, Cora.”

“Why aren’t you coming to dinner?” she asked, not bothering with saying hi or asking how I was.

“Because we have been to the brewery on the daily since it opened,” I pointed out.

“And?” my older, slightly bossy sister asked. I had to bite away a groan. I loved my siblings, but I also liked my time alone. Not to mention, I didn’t mind taking the break from listening to how all of them had something incredible going on, while I most certainly didn’t. Crocheting a temperature blanket wasn’t hot news to them!

“And I don’t know about you, but I like my place. I don’t mind sitting in my living room and?—“

“What? Read? Crochet?” she interrupted haughtily, and my lips twitched. “You literally have the hobbies of an eighty-year-old!”

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