Page 22 of The Stalker Snafu

“Well, at first I thought he was speaking French, so I tried to communicate back,” I explained, wincing at the memory. “I took a few classes in high school. But he wasn’t following, and my vocab is super limited anyway. I think I mentioned my dog at one point, and I don’t even have a dog.”

Noah’s brows rose. “Back up. He spoke to you?”

I nodded, recalling the shadowy guy’s weirdly genuine smile when he’d held his hands up to mine. How strange. “Can’t say I understood what he was saying, but he definitely spoke.”

“He approached you?” Noah surveyed the quad, brows knit.

I was pleased to see he was finally taking this threat seriously.

“Not quite. I ambushed him,” I clarified, feeling pretty proud of myself.

Noah didn’t appear as thrilled.

“You approached him?” He stared at me in disbelief. “Emma, why would you confront someone who was following you? You didn’t know what his intentions were, and he could’ve been dangerous.”

I waved off his concern. “It was fine. I had my pepper spray, and I warned him I wasn’t afraid to use it.”

Noah’s lips moved, but no words came out.

“You have pepper spray?” he finally managed, not sounding any less surprised. I nodded, but his concern only seemed to grow as he rubbed his jaw. “Have you ever used it before?”

I looked down at the freshly cut grass on the quad, which was suddenly incredibly interesting. “Technically, yes, I have.”

“When?”

I’d really been hoping he wouldn’t ask that.

“I tested it once.” There was a ladybug on one of the blades of grass. Cool. “A few years ago.”

Noah didn’t miss the false bravado in my voice. “… And?”

“Well, it might’ve backfired a tiny bit,” I admitted, holding my forefinger and thumb close together to demonstrate just how tiny. “Turns out the spray part of the nozzle was pointed at me instead of the tree trunk I was aiming at, and I sprayed my face. My eyes burned for like a week, so I know this stuff really works.”

His grip tightened on my hand. “It’s not safe to use a weapon you aren’t well-trained with.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t want to test it again after that, and now I’ll never risk spraying myself again because that hurt like… well, like something really bad.”

He just shook his head.

“I can take care of myself, Noah,” I reminded him, swinging our arms together as I zoned in on the lineless coffee cart Scott Holliday was manning. “Contrary to popular belief, I’m actually quite capable of keeping myself alive⁠—”

“Heads up!” a deep voice called across the quad as Noah shook his head at me.

BAM!

A force greater than a train slammed into my side, and I went airborne—flying across the sidewalk before dropping like a sack of potatoes. My head banged against a stone bench, and I crumpled to the ground. Pain reverberated through my skull like a heavy bass beat.

My brain was slow to catch up, but Noah was instantly at my side. I thought I heard him calling my name, but it was difficult to process anything outside the throbbing in my head.

Pain. Pain was all I knew.

Another face appeared next to Noah’s, and everything was surprisingly blurry or blocked by white spots. I might be hallucinating, because the new arrival looked twice as big as my boyfriend.

“I’m—Are you okay?—I’m really sorry,” the large guy apologized, stumbling over his words. “You’re Emma, right? From Philosophy 101? Shit, I didn’t even see you.”

All that escaped my mouth was a pathetic excuse for a groan. I blinked a few times to help clear the white spots.

His face paled, and he stared at my forehead like it wanted to eat him. “Oh God. What can I do? Should we take her to the hospital?”