Keeping Guard

“Harvey, wait here with Kylie for a minute, will you?” He turned to Kylie. “Kylie, let me have your car keys so I can grab your stuff.”

She nodded, fished through her pocket and pulled out a ring of keys. She tossed them to Nate, her hands trembling. She noticed him staring and quickly stuffed her fingers into her jean pockets.

With Kylie under Harvey’s watchful eye, Nate jogged into the rain to her car—the only one in front of his restaurant at this hour. He popped the trunk and heaved out a large—very large—suitcase. This is how the woman packed for a few days?

He slammed the trunk closed and hauled the suitcase inside.

Harvey and Kylie were chatting like old friends when Nate stepped back into the restaurant. Kylie’s face had lost some of its ashen appearance as she squatted, petting Tinkerbell. He noticed her hands still trembled, though.

She stood when Nate approached and leveled her gaze with his, seeming to retrieve some of her confidence. Nate dropped the suitcase in front of her, a little harder than he intended. “Dry clothes.”

He chose not to mention that his were now soaking wet—again. Instead, he looked at Harvey. “Why don’t you go out the back door, Harvey? You won’t get quite as wet.”

“Sounds good.” Harvey winked at Kylie before turning to walk through the kitchen. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning!”

“Tomorrow morning?” Nate questioned.

“I just invited you and Kylie over for breakfast. We’ve got to get to know our new neighbor. It’s the Southern way.”

Nate started to argue but changed his mind. “I’ll see you then, Harvey.” He opened the door for his neighbor, watched as he exited and then turned, expecting to see Kylie behind him. She was gone.

Curiously, he wandered down the hall, through the kitchen and back into the dining area. By the front door, Kylie knelt with a roll of paper towels, wiping up the rain Harvey dripped inside.

“You don’t have to do that, Kylie.”

She glanced up, her face pale again. “It’s okay. I don’t mind. Besides, I need to earn my keep. Call me crazy, but it’s the way I was raised.”

He started to deny what she’d said but changed his mind. Instead, he grabbed some more paper towels and wiped at the wet footprints tracked across the floor.

After they finished cleaning, Nate touched Kylie’s arm. She flinched.

“Listen, I know you’re wet and tired. Will you do me a favor, though?”

She nodded. “Of course.”

“Go upstairs, change and then come back down here, have some coffee and tell me what’s going on. I can’t help you if I’m in the dark.”

She looked numb as she said, “Okay.”

“Let me get your suitcase upstairs for you then.”

Dressed in dry yoga pants, a sweatshirt and slippers, Kylie crept downstairs. Her gaze darted to every dark corner. She flinched at each creak of the old wooden staircase. Her heart sped as she paused by the backdoor.

How had her life become this? Just when she’d been doing so well, truly beginning to stand on her own feet. Then one man had decided to turn her world upside down.

She’d fought coming here, convinced herself that going into hiding made her look weak. She wanted to stay in Kentucky and confront her faceless nightmare head on. Her brother insisted staying in Kentucky wasn’t safe. And after that last encounter with the person she called “the Man in Black,” she’d conceded—but not happily.

She’d come to refer to him as the Man in Black because that was simply all she knew about her stalker. Not knowing what his face looked like only increased her anxiety. His eyes and features were always shadowed by that hood. He could be anyone.

Kylie had seen him only three times. Once he’d been outside the window at her house. Another time he’d been watching in the distance as she went grocery shopping. He hadn’t gotten close to her, but she’d known it was him from the way he’d stood idly by, watching. And at her last cooking demonstration, he’d been there, at the back of the crowd. By the time she’d alerted someone, he’d disappeared, probably abandoning the sweatshirt so police couldn’t identify him.

All she knew was that he was tall, broad-shouldered, relatively thin. On the phone, his voice sounded gravelly and low—probably disguised. In emails, he used proper English, which made Kylie think he had to be educated. On handwritten notes, his writing appeared calm, controlled—like he knew just what he was doing.

Kylie shuddered.

She’d been over a list of suspects with the police, but the list seemed so ambiguous. There was the fan who constantly left aggressive messages on the public online forum to her cooking show. Of course, the police could never trace the address, as the man seemed to use computers at various places around town, all without security cameras. However, the stalker could be someone who’d given no clue to his identity—someone who’d watched her show and developed an obsession, someone who’d seen her shopping and she’d caught his eye. He could be a friend, a neighbor, an ex-boyfriend.

At the thought of an ex-boyfriend, Kylie squeezed her eyes closed. Colin was far too sophisticated and cultured to pull off a stunt like this. Besides, he’d avoided her since they broke up. Why would he avoid her in general and stalk her at every other time? Sure, he’d been controlling, but he would never go this far.

Would he?

They’d dated for a year before Kylie finally had the sense to break up with him. He was the president of a local advertising agency. She’d catered an event at his office and he’d immediately taken an interest in her. She’d been flattered and, initially, swept off her feet. His strength and advice had been comforting in the beginning. But as she got to know him, she realized that the more they were together, the more she was losing herself.

Slowly, he’d begun to isolate her from her friends and family. He’d begun to critique everything she did. He’d begun giving career advice and calling her producer to insist he make it happen. He’d even figured out her email password and begun answering her emails. He’d accepted invitations or declined opportunities without so much as a mention to Kylie. He’d claimed he was only trying to make her into the successful woman she had the potential to be, and in order to do so, she needed to align herself with certain people and write others out of her life completely.

The final straw came when she found out he was cheating on her. She wished she’d seen the signs earlier, that she’d gotten out before discovering his betrayal. The good thing, she comforted herself, was that at least she’d gotten out.

Despite his cheating, Colin hadn’t taken the breakup well. Told her she’d realize her mistake and come running back.

She hadn’t.

Instead, she’d avoided him whenever possible and comforted herself with her friends and family, who’d been terribly neglected. Life had finally started feeling normal and happy again.

Until her stalker showed up.

She braced herself to face Nate. She rounded the corner into the dining room, where Nate sat with two steaming mugs before him. The rain still pounded against the window as the storm raged outside.

Kylie took a minute to observe him as she approached. He really was a good-looking guy in a tough, outdoorsy type of way. As his arms rested on the table, she noticed the fine definition of his muscles peeking out from under his T-shirt. She scolded herself for even noticing.

Nate nodded her way when he spotted her in the doorway, thankfully not seeming to notice that she’d been staring. “Come on over and have a seat, Kylie.”

Her slippers made no sound as she crossed the floor and sat across from Nate. He pushed a ceramic mug toward her.

“It’s decaf.”

She wrapped her fingers around the warmth of the mug. “Thanks.” She normally used cream and sweetener, but tonight she’d drink it black. She sipped the bitter liquid.

“So, Kylie, I need you to tell me what’s going on. I don’t mind you staying here—I’m more than happy to help out you and your brother—but I need to know more about the circumstances bringing you here.”

How did she tell him without causing him to overreact? Of course, with everything that had already happened since she arrived, him overreacting could be a forgone conclusion.

“How much did Bruce tell you?”

“Just that he was fearful for your safety. He told me you would fill in the rest of the blanks.”

She’d have to give her brother credit for that. It must have killed him not to go into detail, but that’s what Kylie had requested. She wanted to handle this mess on her terms, as much as possible, at least.

She sucked in a breath. “The rest of the story would be that a man has been following me—stalking me, I suppose—for the last several months. Recently, he’s become more aggressive. It’s become more and more apparent that this man has no intention of backing off. The police finally collected enough evidence to press charges, but first they have to figure out whom to press charges against. My brother is working with the police to set up a sting and make that happen. I just need to lie low until everything settles.” She looked away and took a sip of coffee.