long and it came gusting from her mouth, blood pounding in her skull. Please don’t hear me. Please don’t hear me. Liza sank to the floor where she pulled her knees to her chest, trying to make herself as small as possible.
This can’t be real. What’s happening to me?
The closet was dark, but there was a thin shaft of light coming in from the room beyond. Liza watched it, her body held tense, teeth chattering with fear. There’s light in here. You’re okay. You’re okay. After a few minutes, Liza heard her front door open, heard someone walk out, and close it behind him, his footsteps growing fainter as he moved away down the outside hallway, until they finally disappeared. She sat frozen, listening intently but there were no other sounds. Had he come in, gone to her room, seen she was gone and figured she wasn’t home? Liza waited, her ears pricked for what felt like an hour, but was more likely ten minutes.
“He can’t hurt you, you know,” Mady whispered from the other side of the closet. “You’re a grownup now.”
Liza’s shoulders dropped, a breath loosening in her chest and gusting softly from her lips. “He can try,” she murmured to her sister, hiding there with her in the shadows.
“How can he do anything? He’s dead. You need to think about this. But first, you need to see if he’s gone. Get your cell phone. It’s on your bedside table and call 911. Go now before he comes back. He’s unlocked the front door. Be brave. Go!”
Okay. Okay, Mady.
Liza stood, opening the closet door as slowly as she’d closed it. It didn’t make a sound. She stood in the open doorway for a minute, listening to her quiet apartment until she got up the nerve to tiptoe to the bedroom door. She took a shaky but silent breath and peeked around the frame. The hallway was empty, but she could see from where she stood that the door was unlocked.
Liza ran quickly to the door, turning the lock with one quick flick of her wrist. Even though she’d heard him exit, heard his footsteps fade away, Liza bent and grabbed the heavy doorstop from the floor to use as a weapon as she moved down the hall to her room—and her phone.
A single white rose lay on her pillow.
Fear trembled through her. Fear and confusion. Deep dread.
Liza held back a scream as she reached for the phone on her bedside table.
**********
“Liza?” His voice. She closed her eyes, took a steadying breath as she heard Reed talking to the officer who had been searching her apartment. A minute later, Reed was there, rushing into the kitchen where she sat at her table, one of the officers that had arrived only twenty minutes before sitting across from her.
“Hey, Garrity,” Reed said and the officer nodded.
“Davies.”
“Hi,” she said, and she was relieved that her voice had finally stopped shaking.
He looked from Officer Garrity and back to her, not seeming to know whom to address. “What happened?” he asked, his eyes coming to rest on her face. He came around the table, pulled out the chair next to her, and positioned it so it was directly facing her. He leaned forward, his gaze washing over her features as he seemed to assess her well-being.
He looked so worried, so stressed, and even though Liza felt somewhat numb, her heart constricted in her chest, a sudden tightening that made her feel almost breathless. He cared about her. He did. And she shouldn’t be happy about that, but she was, and at the moment she wasn’t able to talk herself out of letting him. The backs of her eyes burned. She looked over at Officer Garrity who was filling out some paperwork he’d brought from a notebook on the table in front of him.
“My . . . my father was in my apartment tonight.” She shook her head. “I mean, I thought it was my father, but it couldn’t have been because my father’s dead. So it . . . had to be someone else.”
Reed’s brow dipped. “Did you see this person? His face, I mean?”
“Just his profile. He walked past the door of the room I was in.”
“And that’s how you thought you recognized him? From his walk?”
“I . . . guess, yes. I just . . . it was him.” Her voice broke and she cleared her throat. “I mean, his walk, the set of his chin . . .” Liza wrapped her