Page 5

She laughed to herself.

Idiots, the lot of ‘em.

Remaining isolated behind elaborate gates, not allowing outsiders in, and not involving themselves in social events in the region didn’t help Blackthorn’s reputation.

The middle and high school branch locations operated the same.

She recalled one couple complaining to her ma while their dog received a checkup. Not only had they not been able to enroll their child in Blackthorn Primary, but they offered no extracurricular programs outside of school for her little boy. “Not even a peewee football team,” the wife had complained.

All of the Blackthorn schools lacked sports teams. Which was basically sacrilege in the South.

Charlotte had met all of Blaire’s new friends from the academy, soon becoming fast friends with the manic pixie Riley, Aiden’s younger sister, who now worked for her mom as an apprentice at the clothing boutique. While she was a year or so younger than Charlotte, Riley was finishing her sophomore year too, working toward a fashion design degree. It surprised her to learn Riley skipped a grade in middle school.

Aiden had reached out when Blaire got kidnapped by some weird guy who became obsessed with her, and ever since, he had kept in close contact. Charlotte welcomed the connection.

Blaire and Riley believed something was happening between them, but there was nothing. Not that she would be completely against it. Aiden was a sweet guy, and gorgeous, too.

They just shared similar interests. It turned out he loved video games as much as she did, and it was nice to have a friend to game with online; Blaire wasn’t into it. But they had little time to play together online anymore since she joined UGA, so their communication had dwindled.

She struggled to convince herself staying in Athens was a good idea.

Approaching her apartment, she cringed. A bundle of pink roses lay in front of her door.

Quickening her steps, she reached her door and unlocked it. She picked up the wrapped bundle and rushed inside, not bothering to see if anyone lingered in the hall. After the man on the street earlier, and now the roses, she needed the safety of her studio apartment.

Closing the door behind her and locking it, she carried the bouquet into the kitchen. She placed the roses on the long granite counter. A small white note card tucked into the flowers taunted her. Instead, she turned to glance around the apartment for anything out of the ordinary.

A tiny closet only big enough to house a stacked washer and dryer behind a door divided the living area from the bedroom area. Against the left wall of the laundry room, a small entertainment center faced the living area. On the right side of the laundry room, her headboard butted the wall beside a window with small fairy lights draped over it. A small night table with a lamp draped in a sheer celestial print scarf to dim the light fit next to the bed. The remaining space at the foot of her bed held a tall chest of drawers. A closet with mirrored doors took up most of the wall on the far side of the bed.

On the opposite wall from the dresser, her computer, several candles, and tiny plants decorated a small desk with two framed star charts representing the night sky when she was born, and the other, the night sky the night she was adopted. A bathroom on the other side of the wall behind her desk afforded the only privacy in the small apartment. The door to the bathroom stood to the right of the kitchen area.

Nothing looked out of place, but sweeping her apartment for any disturbance had become a habit for her over the few weeks since the rose deliveries started. Even if it were only a secret admirer, it still made her paranoid. Guys who liked her in the past didn’t come to her house or have gifts delivered, so this situation was completely new to her, and she didn’t like the feelings it elicited.

She crossed the living room to sit on the small gray loveseat under a line of framed art prints of the various zodiac signs represented by fairies. The loveseat sat perpendicular to the sliding glass doors, facing the entertainment center. Kicking off her flats, she grabbed the remote from the coffee table and turned on the television, turning the volume down low. She wasn’t interested in what was on the screen, only the background noise it provided.

She pulled out her phone and leaned against the throw pillows in the corner of the loveseat to scroll through TikTok, distracting herself from the unpleasantness on the counter, but eventually, even songs made from cat noises couldn’t stave off her curiosity.

For almost a month, everything remained consistent. Pink roses were left in front of her door with no clue as to the sender. Never had there been a card included, and it got under her skin that the status quo changed.

Throwing her phone on the cushion, she stood and stomped over to the kitchen, pulling the note card from the bouquet. Flipping open the flap, her blood ran cold at the typed note.

You looked lovely this morning. Purple suits you.

She looked down at the lavender short-sleeved blouse she wore with a pair of dark jeggings. Anyone could have seen her in her outfit that morning. She went out for breakfast, stopped by her advisor’s office, and attended classes. The University of Georgia wasn’t a small school. On average, total enrollment was over forty thousand. Fewer students attended in the summer—around sixteen thousand—but that left tons of options. Whoever kept leaving roses for her didn’t have to be in her program of study.

Then there was whoever kept following her.

For longer than the roses started showing up at her door, she had the feeling of someone following her, but hadn’t been certain. Until tonight. She hadn’t seen anyone before now, so she questioned if being so far from home was to blame for her paranoia.

Rosebrook Valley was a town you could walk around in without question at any time. Athens had the same kind of casual atmosphere where students walked the streets at night without worry, but the population was larger, and the shops, bars, and restaurants weren’t condensed to a small outdoor outlet mall. The larger area took time to get used to.

Still, she had questioned her sanity whenever she suspected someone followed her, and now she tried to rationalize the unwanted attention as side effects to her antidepressants. Anything to not accept the sickening reality.

A crash in the bathroom made her yelp and drop the card. She rushed back over to the front door and grabbed the baseball bat she kept there for protection.

She had laughed when her neighbor gave it to her when she mentioned she lived alone. He told her his daughter who was the same age lived alone on the other side of the country. He insisted his daughter do the same thing. Charlotte didn’t know how fathers behaved, never having one in her life, but he didn’t seem creepy, so she humored him.

“Thank you, Trevor. I’ll never doubt your intentions again,” she muttered as she approached the bathroom door with the bat held high.