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OAKLEY
Myphonebuzzesonmy bedside table, and I open my eyes to the early afternoon sun streaming through my window. I groan, throwing my arm over my face, trying to block out the sun, but now that I’ve seen it, it’s impossible to ignore.
Letting out a heavy sigh, I reach for my phone, feeling around the table until my hand curls around the cool metal. Tearing it off its charger, I bring the phone over my face and squint into the light as I unlock it. There’s a text from Heather, and I quickly open it while wishing she could have allowed me just a few more hours of sleep. I’m a solid twelve-hour-a-night sleeper, and if I don’t get in all the z’s, I have a tendency of becoming one hell of a cranky bitch.
Heather - Hope you’re holding up after last night’s shift. The rest of your week looks like this. Let me know if there are any problems. Saturday: 7pm–close, Monday: 5pm–10pm, Wednesday: 5pm–10pm, Friday: 7pm–close.
I quickly start hashing out a response.
Oakley - No problem. I’m good with all of those.
Heather - Perfect. I won’t be in tonight, but check in with Hannah. She’ll have a set of keys for you. Don’t lose them because I’m not getting you another.
Assuming she’s not someone who requires a response to every single text, I put my phone down and throw my blankets back before climbing out of my shitty bed. Don’t get me wrong, I slept like a baby, but that’s only because I was so exhausted after my first shift. Any other night, I would have struggled to sleep on that lumpy mattress. It’ll have to do for now though. The second I’m able to save up a bit of cash, once I’m on top of my loans and rent, a new mattress will be my first priority.
I drag my feet as I make my way to my bedroom door, and as my gaze rises and I reach for the handle, I come to a standstill, my eyes widening. A matte black card, the size of a playing card, has been stuck to the back of my door with a small dagger, a glossy black E directly in the center, pierced by the sharp blade.
My heart races, and I find myself just staring at it, unable to move. I know I was tired when I came home last night, but I’m damn sure that wasn’t there. “Cara?” I call out, reaching for the door handle and pulling it open just a fraction, keeping my eyes glued to the black card as if it will disappear at any moment.
I hear her from her bedroom, groaning from being woken. “Oh my God, no. I thought we talked about boundaries.”
“I’m not fucking around, girl. Get your ass in here.”
She groans a little more, but I hear her throw the blankets back before trudging out of bed. Her door creaks, and I hear her footsteps on the timber floorboards before she finally appears in front of my room. “This better be important.”
I clench my jaw, second-guessing everything I learned about this girl yesterday. Reaching out into the hallway, I grip her arm and pull her into my room before closing my door and pointing to the black card stabbed to the back of it. “Did you do this?”
Her eyes bug out of her head and she blinks rapidly, trying to focus. “What the fuck?” she breathes, shaking her head, fear flashing in her eyes. “I . . . no. I swear, I didn’t put it there.”
“Then how the fuck did it get here?” I question. “I know damn well it wasn’t there when I went to bed last night. I would have noticed it. Plus, I locked and deadbolted the door when I came in after my shift. You’re the only other person in this apartment.”
“Hey, don’t be accusing me of something I didn’t do,” she argues, getting defensive. “When I tell you I didn’t do this, I mean it. I went to bed like twenty minutes after you did and didn’t leave my room until right now.”
I point to the door again, frustration burning me from within. “Then how the hell did this black card get stabbed to the back of my door?”
She shakes her head. The longer she looks at it, the more freaked out she seems to get. “I have no fucking idea. I watched you deadbolt the door,” she says, moving closer to the back of my door to get a better look at the silver dagger and what looks to be some kind of calling card . . . but for what? “This shouldn’t be possible. Are you sure it wasn’t there before you went to bed? You were pretty exhausted. You could have easily missed it.”
“There’s no way I would have missed that,” I mutter. “Besides, you were here all night. You would have seen if someone came in, right? Did anyone come knocking on the door? Or did you leave for a minute?”
“No, nothing. I literally didn’t move from the couch all night.”
I drag my hands over my face, pushing them up into my hair as I pace my room, my gut telling me what I already know. Our creepy as fuck neighbors did this. There’s no other explanation. They were stalking me all night, and now they’ve somehow managed to slip into my room in the dead of night to put this here.
My hands shake as Cara moves even closer to the back of the door. “E,” she murmurs. “What does that even mean?”
“I’ve got no fucking idea,” I tell her. “But I think we’ve got bigger problems to work out than that. Like how the hell did someone get into our apartment while we slept? And more than that, how was this asshole able to stab a knife through the door with neither of us noticing?”
Cara’s whole body shakes as she fumbles back and drops her ass on the edge of my bed. “I don’t like this, Oakley,” she says, her eyes wide and terrified. “I swear, if you’ve brought some kind of mess from back home—”
“I haven’t,” I rush out.
“Swear it to me,” she insists. “I read way too many dark romance books to be cool with any of this. It sounds hot in books, but in reality, I don’t fucking like it. I can’t handle this type of shit. If there’s something I need to know or you’re mixed up with some questionable dudes, then tell me now because this living arrangement isn’t going to work. I’m sorry, but I need to look out for myself.”
“I swear,” I tell her. “I’m not mixed up with anything.”
Cara watches me a second later, as if trying to figure out if she can trust me, and after what feels like a lifetime, she finally nods. “Okay,” she says. “So, what do we do? Should we call the police?”
I shrug my shoulders. “I . . . I don’t know,” I tell her. “I think we should check the apartment first. You know, make sure nothing is missing. Check the door and windows and . . . I don’t know. Try and figure out how this happened before we go and make claims to the cops that someone broke in here.”
