Girl Next Door - The Complete Series (39 page)

Save one for me
, was his response.
See you around midnight. Don’t wait up.

I texted my good-bye and settled down to get back to work. It looked like I was only carving one pumpkin this year. Again, I felt that happy little flip in my tummy, this one harder to ignore.

I cut the top off the pumpkin and started scooping out the seeds. I threw them in a bowl to be washed and dried so I could roast them in the oven with some salt. I really liked knowing that Troy was coming home to me at night. And that he wanted to do a fun thing like decorate for Halloween. I set about cutting out the facial features with a paring knife.

Just as I finished the face, the doorbell rang. The pizza place had perfect timing. I laid my knife next to the pumpkin and washed my hands quickly in the sink. The doorbell rang again. I guess the delivery guy was in a hurry.

I hurried to the door, wallet in my hand, and yanked it open. It wasn’t a delivery guy. It was Grayson. I started to slam the door shut in his face, but his foot was in the way. To keep him from trying to come inside, I pulled the door back open and shoved him back. I stepped onto the porch, crossing my arms over my chest from the cold, and glared at him.

“What in the hell are you doing here, Grayson? I’m pretty sure we both said all we had to say a few days ago.”

He held his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “I know, I know. I’m sorry, but there’s something I need to talk to you about and your boyfriend interrupted before I could tell you last time.

I waited. When he didn’t continue, I said, “And?”

I made no effort to be nice. The asshole called me a cunt. He didn’t deserve Polite Amy. Actually, he deserved ‘Kick You in the Nuts’ Amy, but she wouldn’t be making an appearance today because I wanted to get this over with and go back inside.

“It’s my wife. She’s completely lost it,” he said.

Well that got my attention. “Your
wife
?” I screeched. “You’re married?!” I punched him in shoulder. “You asshole! You give me shit for refusing to sleep with you, but you were trying to cheat on your wife with me!” I took another swing at him, but he managed to evade my right hook.

“Fine. Whatever. The point is she’s gone crazy. She found out about you, and she’s been talking about making you pay.”

“Making me pay? She should be thinking about punishing your sorry ass. I didn’t even know you were married. I hope she does stop by. I’ll suggest she castrate your sorry ass!”

The pizza delivery guy pulled up as I finished yelling at Grayson. We both looked over at him as he climbed out of his car. The poor kid seemed intimidated as he came up the front walk.

“Hi,” he said, his eyes bouncing back and forth between Grayson and me nervously.

“Hi. Here, keep the change,” I said. I gave him the money, wanting him and Grayson gone.

The kid’s eyes widened when he realized that I had just given him a ten dollar tip.

“Thanks!”

He scurried back to his car and left.

I turned back to the asshat on my front porch. “Thanks for the head’s up, Grayson. I’ll be sure to let Troy know. Especially since this crazy ass wife of yours has egged my house, left a flaming bag of dog shit on my porch, keyed my car, and destroyed half my wardrobe and most of my bedroom furniture. Now, I never want to see you again.”

With that, I whirled on my heel, stepped back into my house, and slammed the door behind me. I carried the pizza to the oven and stuck it inside. I set the oven on the lowest setting to keep the pizza warm, and went to grab my phone. Even though Troy was busy, I was sure he would want to know about this latest development.

My fingers touched my phone, and it immediately started to ring. Damn, this was getting freaky. First the doorbell ringing just as I finished carving pumpkins and now the phone ringing just before I needed it. Feeling creeped out, I answered the phone without looking at the screen to see who was calling.

“Hello?”

“I told you to stay away from what belongs to me. Now you have to pay, bitch.”

Holy shit, it was Grayson’s wife, and she sounded
pissed
.

“Look, I didn’t know Grayson was married. If I had I never would have had anything to do with him,” I explained.

“Doesn’t matter, cunt. Watch your back.”

There was a click when she hung up in my ear. What was it about people calling me the c-word lately? Maybe she learned that word from Grayson.

My hands were shaking as I called Troy’s cell. He didn’t answer. I honestly hadn’t expected him to because I knew he was busy. So I left him a message, and I dug in my purse and got the number for the officer who was investigating everything. He answered.

I was slightly out of breath as I explained what had just happened and repeated what Grayson told me. I also told him about the call from the crazy woman.

Detective Burns asked me several questions and had me repeat a few things to be certain he had all the facts. Then he asked for Grayson’s number and address. I provided him with the information, and he said he would give me a call the next day with an update.

After we hung up, I wondered how in the hell Grayson had hidden the fact that he was married. I had only been to his apartment a couple of times since we started dating. I avoided it because he started getting a little pushy about sex after we had dated for a few weeks.

I felt a little relieved though. Now I knew who had been vandalizing my stuff, and I hoped that Detective Burns could have this straightened out and Grayson’s wife in custody before the end of the week.

Still feeling shell shocked, I took the pumpkin seeds to the sink and washed them thoroughly. I left them in a colander to drain and pulled my pizza out of the oven. I put a couple of slices on a plate, grabbed a beer out of the fridge, and went into the living room since my dining table was still covered with pumpkin guts.

I turned on the television, more for company than anything else, and grabbed my Kindle off the coffee table. I had several books on my To-be-read list and had been too busy to read them lately. With everything going on, I needed a peaceful night. Remembering that Detective Burns knew who the culprit was and would soon have her in custody helped me relax. At least I had the comfort of knowing things couldn’t get worse.

Later I would realize how very wrong I was.

The sensation of icy cold hands sliding on my skin woke me from a dead sleep. I sat straight up, cracking my forehead against Troy’s chin, and screamed from a mixture of fear and pain.

“Dammit!” Troy jerked away, cursing and rubbing his jaw.

I rubbed the top of my head, glaring at Troy in the dimness of the bedroom.

“What the hell?” I asked, rubbing my forehead. “Why did you do that?”

Troy shrugged. “I did it as a joke, but I don’t think I’ll be waking you out of a dead sleep ever again anyway. First you took a swing at me, and then you head butted me.”

I glanced at the clock and saw it was only eleven. I had done as Troy suggested and gone to bed before he came home. After the stress of the previous week, I was tired and needed the extra sleep. I had only been asleep about an hour and a half.

“Why did you wake me up?” I asked.

“I got your message about an hour ago and decided to come home early. I was hoping to catch you before you went to sleep. We need to talk about you, and what you need to do to stay safe.”

I rubbed my eyes. “Detective Burns planned to track her down tonight and arrest her.”

Troy shook his head. “Lance said that he couldn’t find her. He called her asshole husband and he didn’t know where she was. The fact that she called you immediately after the dickwad left tells me that she’s probably watching the house. I’ve arranged for a patrol car to do a drive-by every hour or two until she’s caught, but tomorrow is Halloween, and I doubt they’ll be able to come by as often as I’d like.”

Still rubbing my aching forehead, I sat up and put my back against the headboard. “I’m sorry, Troy. I’m still a little foggy here. What exactly are you saying?” I asked.

“She’s watching you, Amy. You can’t let your guard down until she is caught. From what Lance Burns learned from her husband, she’s not well. It seems she’s always been a little fragile, but, when she found out he was seeing you, it broke her. According to Grayson, she’s had episodes before and she can be violent, so you need to be extremely careful until Lance tracks her down.”

“She’s watching me?” I whispered. God, now I felt vulnerable.

Troy’s hands cupped my shoulders. “Hey, hold on. I just want you to be careful, and I want you to understand that it’s very important you keep an eye on your surroundings.”

I nodded. “Okay, okay. I won’t freak out. It never crossed my mind when she called me tonight that she might be watching me. I should have realized because she called right after Grayson left.”

Troy stood and started stripping out of his clothes. When he was down to his black briefs, he climbed into bed next to me and pulled me close. I relaxed against him as he put his arms around me and rubbed my back and shoulders gently.

“It’ll all work out, Amy. I promise.”

I didn’t reply because, with his arms around me, I felt safe. So safe that I had fallen back to sleep.

The next day I felt as though I had eyes on me all day long. While I was at school, I felt much safer. The security at the middle school and high school was almost as good as the airport. It was when I walked to my car in the morning and went about my daily business outside of work that I constantly looked over my shoulder, expecting a crazy woman to jump out and attack me.

On my lunch break, my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number but answered it anyway. It was Detective Lance Burns.

“Ms. Bennett?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I’m glad I was able to reach you. We have Theresa Garrett in custody.”

I felt the tension in my muscles begin to leak out.

“So it’s over?” I asked, relieved.

“For now. Eventually she will be released on bail, but it probably won’t be until tomorrow. Also, we will arrange for a protection order. If she violates it then they will remand her until the trial.”

“Great. Thanks, Detective Burns.”

After I disconnected the phone, I felt a million pounds lighter. I texted Troy, who already knew of course. It seems Detective Burns had called him first.

“I’m just glad it’s over.”

“Me, too, babe,” Troy said. “Have fun handing out candy tonight. I’ll be home around nine or ten.” He paused. “Don’t leave the porch light on too late. I want you all to myself when I get home.”

I shivered. I really liked the sound of that.

“Okay, babe. I’ll see you later.”

I went through the rest of my day in a cloud of relief and anticipation. Relief that the whole situation with Theresa Garrett was over and anticipation of Troy coming home. I decided to plan a little surprise.

Since it was Halloween, I had let all my students skip piano lessons so they could get ready for trick or treating, so I didn’t have any commitments after school. When classes let out, I headed straight to the mall to Fredrick’s of Hollywood. Victoria’s Secret was all about pretty, feminine, and sexy in a classy way. I wanted something really naughty. I knew exactly what I wanted. I found a very sexy and extremely racy black and white lace and satin merry widow with garters and stockings. I had the perfect black stilettos at home. I bought a matching black satin G-string but I didn’t think I would wear it. I wanted to drive Troy crazy in a fun way rather than in anger. Looking at my purchase, I had a feeling I would succeed.