“And what did you tell him?” Jamie’s voice is urgent in Isabel’s ear.
“I told him I thought we should just be friends.” Isabel grabs a quart of milk and virtually hurls it into the shopping cart.
Jamie lets out a low whistle. “Ouch, that’s gotta hurt! Didn’t he ask you why?”
Isabel nods though her friend can’t see her through the telephone line and rubs her temples, as if she can rub out the memory. “Yes, of course he did. You know Mike. He’s a man who gets what he wants. He’s not used to just taking the first explanation he’s given.”
“So you told him about Wes.” There’s no question in Jamie’s voice. Isabel pauses, just long enough to give herself away. “Issy! Why wouldn’t you just tell him?”
Isabel shakes her head; she’s been berating herself over that very same fact since the call the day before. “I don’t know. It just seemed a little…I don’t know, harsh? ‘Hey, I don’t want to be with you and by the way I’m sort of but not really dating someone else.’ Yeah, that would have gone really well.” She rolls her eyes at the thought.
“So what did you tell him?” The sound of panting in the background tells Isabel Jamie has sped up her walking, which can only mean that she’s running late, as always.
“I pretended there was static on the line, that I couldn’t hear him and then hung up.” Isabel squints her eyes, cringing at how pathetic she knows her behavior was. It had been the first thing that had come into her head and had seemed like a viable solution. Now it just seemed stupid. She’d acted like a teenager. “I’m pretty sure he knew I was faking it.”
“Duh, you think?” Jamie doesn’t even try to hide her exasperation at her friend. “And I’m guessing you haven’t been picking up his calls since.” Isabel remains silent but that in itself speaks volumes. “Jeez, it’s almost enough to make me feel sorry for the guy and I think he’s duller than ditchwater!”
“Jamie!” Isabel berates her friend.
“What? I don’t think you get to go defending him when you’re the one dodging his calls like they’re bullets.” Jamie’s reasoning, as always, is unmatched. “The next time you speak to Mike, you have to tell him, Issy, as much for your sake as for his. I know you and I know the guilt is eating you up inside. That shit is not healthy. So do we have a deal?”
“Deal.” Isabel sighs deeply, knowing that her friend is right, depressingly so.
“Now, tell me all about what’s going on with the delectable Wesley?” Jamie doesn’t bother to hide her glee.
“I don’t even know where to start with that one, Jamie. And anyway, how do you know he’s delectable?” Isabel flushes as an elderly woman in the fruit aisle gives her a disapproving look before wandering off.
“Because you get all breathless when you talk about him. I know all your tells, Bishop. So dish, what’s the latest?” Jamie is too damn intuitive for her own good, Isabel thinks to herself.
“Honestly, J, I don’t know.” There’s a lot of that going around lately, Isabel thinks to herself. “It’s not like there’s anything official. I don’t think you can really say we’re dating, we’re not in a relationship, and we’re not fuck buddies.” She lowers her voice as she says the curse, not wanting the whole market to know about her love life. She looks around her aisle and notices a guy staring at her curiously. She breaks eye contact with him and focuses back on her conversation with Jamie.
“But you like him.” Jamie has a way of cutting to the chase.
“Yes.” What would be the point in denying it?
“And you care about him.” Isabel imagines the hand gestures Jamie is making as a horn honks at her in the background.
“Yes and would you please stop jaywalking!” Isabel sighs heavily, grabbing the items off of the shelves as if she’s on autopilot.
“Chill, Issy, I’m still in one piece.” Her friend’s voice is reassuring but Isabel still can’t help but worry about her. “So do you L-O-V-E him?”
Isabel rolls her eyes, laughing at the singsong note in her friend’s voice. “You don’t have to spell it, Jamie. We’re not eight!” She turns around and sees the same guy that was staring at her before. At first, Isabel thought she was just imagining things, but now there’s no doubt about it; he’s looking at her fixedly. The expression on his face sets a shiver down her spine and it’s not just the long scar that runs from his temple to the corner of his mouth. Definitely a knife-wound, she tells herself.
“Issy, are you even listening to me?” Jamie’s insistent voice in her ear reminds Isabel that she is, in fact, not listening to her friend.
She spins on her heel and walks in the opposite direction of the mystery man. “Sorry, just some creepy guy.”
“What creepy guy?” The concern in her friend’s voice is clear.
“It’s nothing, Jamie. Don’t worry. I’m in the market, in the middle of the day with about thirty witnesses. I don’t think you have anything to worry about. All right?” Isabel feels in her back pocket for her mother’s letter. It had become a little security blanket for her and she instantly feels calmer, just knowing it’s there.
“Fine.” Jamie’s admission is begrudging. “So have you and Wes exchanged that little four letter word or not? The suspense is killing me, Issy!”
Isabel laughs at her drama queen friend. “No.” She shakes her head firmly. “It’s way too soon for that.”
“Too soon…right.” The disbelief in Jamie’s tone is crystal clear, despite the distance. “Well, you sound happier than I’ve heard you in ages, Issy. So something must be going right between the two of you.”
Isabel smiles to herself, her friend’s words echoing what she hadn’t quite been able to put her finger on until now. “Yeah, I guess so. Maybe I’m not doomed to be miserable for the rest of my life!”
“And you were getting so good at it, too!” Jamie joins her in the joke and they laugh easily together, making Isabel remember how she misses her friend.
“Well, there’s still time.” Isabel doesn’t add that there’s also the glaringly obvious fact that her mood seems to be linked to Wesley’s appearance in her life and she doesn’t want to think how she’s going to feel when he inevitably leaves. But, perhaps, he won’t leave. Perhaps there’s a chance he’ll stay, that things could work out between them. After the thoughts and feelings about his past that he’d shared with her the day before, perhaps he was seeing this as something more than just a passing thing.
“Earth to Isabel.” Jamie’s bored tone tells Isabel that she’s been absent from the call again. “Where do you keeping going to, girl?”
“Nowhere, just daydreaming, I guess.” Isabel heads towards the cashier, eager to get out of the market and away from the guy she can feel staring her in the back, as if his eyes are laser-beams.
“Well, sometimes daydreams come true, Issy. Remember that. Oh yeah and I’m home in a few days. You haven’t forgotten?” Jamie had been talking about her trip back nonstop for most of their recent conversations; Isabel would have to have dementia not to remember it.
“Can’t wait to see you!” It’s true; Isabel has missed her friend. Phone calls were all well and good but nothing beat the real thing.
“Me neither and can’t wait to meet the man who has stolen my friend’s heart! Love you, bye!” Before Isabel can argue that no one has robbed her of any part of her anatomy, Jamie has ended the call.
Isabel smiles at the cashier, thanking her as she pays for the groceries. There’s a little spring in her step as she walks out of the market. Just that morning she’d had two new tenants arrive and three more enquiries via the website. She was starting to believe that, perhaps, things were looking up for the boarding house and for her. Still, she can’t shake the feeling of nervousness that has been hanging around her since she’d caught the creepy guy staring at her. She’s never been prone to flapping, but there’s an inescapable feeling of disquiet that hovers around her as she hurries out of the store while simultaneously telling herself she has nothing to be afraid of.
Out in the sunshine she takes a breath of air, smiling ruefully at herself for being so silly. It’s only when she gets that prickly sensation on the back of her neck that she finds herself quickening her step along the busy street. It’s the lunch hour so there are people out on terraces at the cafés and restaurants, enjoying the fact that summer seems to have finally arrived in Chicago.
As she turns a corner, her arms piled high with grocery bags, she sneaks a look behind her. She has to stop herself from breaking out into a run when she sees the man from the market is behind her. In fact, not only is he behind her, but he’s making no bones about the fact that he’s following her. She tries to calm herself, to shorten her strides, to slow down before she trips and falls; that’s the last thing she needs. She reminds herself that she’s on a busy street, in the middle of the day, that there’s nothing he can do to her without a whole heap of witnesses. But what if he doesn’t care about witnesses, she asks herself? What if he’s just some psycho that likes to stalk women and kill them in horrendous and unthinkable ways? Get a grip, Bishop!
Her panic is starting to mount as she’s only a couple of blocks away from the boarding house and he’s clearly gaining on her. She has no intention of leading him to her house; that was surely one of the basic tenets of self-defense. She would know that if she hadn’t skipped those particular classes during college to spend more time studying. Great job, Isabel. She slows her pace, knowing she’s about to hit the end of the busy street and turn onto her more residential road. If she’s going to run into a store to call for help she’s about to run out of luck.
But instead of doing that, instead of doing the sensible thing, she does the opposite, the thing that every self-defense course and every after school special tells you not to do. She whirls around and confronts the guy who’s following her. The man’s eyes open wide as if she’s done the last thing he would have expected. He’s not alone in that; Isabel is pretty surprised herself.
Putting down her grocery bags so she can make a quick escape if she needs to, she crosses her arms in front of her chest so he can’t see her hands trembling. “Why are you following me?” She’s pleased that her voice doesn’t wobble, doesn’t give away the nervousness that’s making her spine tingle.
The man’s expression changes from surprise to one of open admiration. He looks her up and down from her sandal-clad feet up her shapely legs in their cut off shorts to the white shirt she’s wearing, which suddenly feels like it doesn’t leave anything to the imagination. He’s openly appraising her and it’s so different from the way Wesley looks at her. There’s something dark and disturbing in his gaze.
Seeing him up close, the scar on his face looks even nastier than she had thought. His blue eyes and blonde hair make him look like he’s an All-American boy gone wrong. His leather jacket catches her eye, but she puts it down to the fact that she’s so used to seeing Wes in his.
Angry at the way he’s looking at her, as if she is a piece of meat, she tosses her head and looks him square in the eyes. The coldness she sees there would be enough for her to think twice about engaging this man in conversation if she weren’t so mad. “What, you don’t speak?” She taps her foot, impatient for him to give her an answer instead of staring at her with that disconcerting expression on his face. “Why are you following me?”
Without saying a word, he holds out an envelope, one she recognizes immediately. It has her mother’s handwriting on the front; it’s the letter she carries around with her at all times. But that can’t be; it’s right there in her back pocket. Her hand flies to her pockets to verify that it’s exactly where she left it. But she comes up empty.
“You dropped it when you were in such a hurry to pay the cashier in the market. I was just trying to give it back to you, figured it was important.” He shrugs, holding out the letter, his eyes still fixed on her in a way that makes her uncomfortable.
She takes the letter, verifying with her own two hands that it is what she thinks it is. At the realization that this man wasn’t stalking her, that all the paranoid thoughts running through her mind were laughable in the extreme she is flooded with relief and also embarrassment. “Thank you. This really means a lot to me. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d lost it.” She tucks the letter safely back in her pocket, making sure it’s not going anywhere. “And I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to accuse you of anything. I was just a little on edge, I guess.”
“That’s all right. I get it. Some strange guy you don’t know follows you down a street and you think the worse.” He shrugs, as if it makes perfect sense. “Took some balls to call me out, though.” The admiration in his voice doesn’t quite reach his eyes.
Isabel is struck by the feeling that what comes out of his mouth is completely different to what he’s actually thinking. She nods, smiling, telling herself she’s being paranoid again. “Well, it probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do.” She knows it’s a pretty big understatement.
He shrugs, still showing his teeth, like a shark. “So, you live around here?”
Isabel nods, unsure why such a basic question puts her on high alert. “Not far.” She doesn’t offer anything else. “How about you? I don’t think I’ve seen you ‘round here before.” She keeps her tone light, but she doesn’t miss he flash of irritation that passes over his features before he schools them into something more neutral.
“No, I’m just…visiting a friend.” He chuckles lightly as if there is something funny she’s missed.
“Great, well, I guess they’re probably waiting for you and I should be getting back.” Isabel crouches down to pick up the grocery bags.
“No, it’s kind of a surprise. He doesn’t know I’m coming.” The steel in his voice makes her freeze, but when she looks up at him, there’s no hint of the coldness she’s just heard. “Hey, let me give you a hand with those.” He reaches out to take one of the bags before Isabel can tell him not to.
“Really, don’t worry. I can handle them. I’m used to it.” She shrugs and smiles at him, winningly, wondering how she can take the bag from him without seeming rude.
“Well, if you ask me, you shouldn’t have to be used to it. A pretty lady like you should have someone to help her.” His lecherous grin tells Isabel he’s trying to be charming, but it’s clearly not an art he’s used to practicing. “I bet you have a boyfriend who’d be more than happy to help you with whatever you need.” He says the words as if he knows something she doesn’t, and Isabel gets that sensation again that there’s something going on that runs deeper than idle chat.
She doesn’t say anything, just smiles politely.
“So does that mean your single?” He gives her a wink that’s a little too knowing for a guy she’s just met.
It wasn’t too knowing for Wesley, she reminds herself. But that was different, her internal voice counters. Why was it different? And the answer is simple: because it was Wes.
“Can I get your number?”
Isabel frowns, trying to figure out why a pickup line she’s heard a hundred times before is making her so uncomfortable. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude, but I don’t usually just give my number out to guys I’ve just met on the street.” She smiles to take the sting out of the rejection. “No matter how chivalrous!”
He blinks, as if he’s not used to hearing the word ‘no.’ But he rallies, smiling that predatory smile again. “That’s probably a good rule. You never know who you might be meeting.” His words seem to be laced with meaning and she shivers in spite of herself.
“Right.” She rocks on her heels wanting to get out of this conversation. “Well, it was good to meet you and thanks again for the letter. I really do appreciate it.” She holds her hand out for the grocery bag. “Now, I really should be going before I’m missed.” She lets the last phrase fall as if it were just a throwaway comment, but from the heated look in his eyes she knows he’s understood why she’s said it.
“Sure.” He hands over the grocery bag, stepping closer to her and drawing himself up to his full height and width. There’s no doubt he’s making a point, that he’s bigger and stronger than she is.
But Isabel refuses to be intimidated. She stands her ground, not moving an inch, not backing down.
He smiles patronizingly, before stepping away and giving her back her personal space. “You be careful now. You never know what sort of bad men could be lurking around, ready to do harm to a pretty girl like you.” He flashes white teeth, but it’s nowhere near warm enough to be taken as a smile.
“Don’t you worry about me. I can look after myself. Anyway, thanks again.” She turns around, taking a few steps away from him.
“I’ll be seeing you.” It’s not what he says, but the way he says it, as if it were a veiled threat.
She doesn’t respond the first thing that comes to her mind: that she has no intention of seeing him ever again. Instead, she waves vaguely behind her and strides purposefully down the road. She stops herself from hurrying, telling herself to be calm. She has to force herself not to look behind her as she does. The man’s words echo through her mind, making the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. I’ll be seeing you. All she can think of is getting back home and getting back to Wesley. She wonders when the two had become synonymous, but all she knows is that they have.