Chapter 26

“No, all of you are accusing me.” I said, clutching my hair in frustration.

“Skylar, it’s part of the interrogation.” Ethan tried to step in and save his friend from my accusation.

“No, it’s not.” I said. “They’re here to know what happened. They can’t tell that it is all a hallucination.”

“We are just saying that it could be one. We’re not sure either.” Ethan’s friend, who came as soon as he could when I wanted to report the incident, spoke to me in a calm tone.

“Then you have absolutely no right to claim your opinion,” I said. “I know for certain that what happened to me was not a hallucination. I can’t explain how they didn’t leave any evidence behind, that’s your job to find out by the way, but I know that I’m not lying.”

Owens sighed from the seat across from me. He moved in exhaustion and glanced at Ethan, “Your wife is not in the right state of mind to proceed with the investigation. We should reschedule this to sometime later.”

Ethan nodded at him and came to fetch me. Without throwing any glance at the extremely frank and presumptuous bunch of men in suits. Ethan led me to the elevator and asked for me to wait there for me until he finished his talk with his friend.

Whilst I waited there, my eyes involuntarily ran over the surrounding, scrutinizing every detail of the walls just so I could kill some time. My eyes found a glass that joined two walls in the center of the hallway and lingered there for a while. I stared back into my faint reflection on the wall and noticed how my eyes were now much droopier and I had acquired dark circled underneath.

I wiped the area under my skin in an attempt to get rid of those marks that were slowly making me appear hideous to my own self, but it was in vain. When I almost gave up on rectifying the flaws of my face, I felt something ping in my hands.

I looked at the phone and read the text.

That was just the beginning. There’s more coming in your way. Tell your man to keep you safe. Xx A sudden wave of adrenaline rushed through my mind. I could barely comprehend the perfectly coherent words written in front of me. Without knowing what to do, I rushed to Ethan.

“Ethan,” I said in a hurry, making him turn towards me in a second. “Ethan, they. they sent me a message!”

“Skylar, wait.” He said, holding my arms in his. “You need to calm down, who are you talking about you?”

“The intruders. They. they sent me a message.” I said, shoving my phone into his hands. “See for yourself.”

“Give it to me.” Owen took my phone and swiped his fingers across the screen. Ethan watched the screen with him, both of them wearing a confused frown on their foreheads.

“They said that it was just the beginning, and. and that there’s more to come. They warned us. They asked us to be safe.”

Ethan fixed me with an irritated look. “Skylar, what is happening to you?”

“What?” I asked him in surprise. Why is he looking upset? Shouldn’t he be worried about the message?

“Skylar, you don’t have any text of that sort,” Owen said to me.

“That. that’s impossible.” I said and snatched my phone from his hand. Frantically wiping my screen, I was shocked to find that their words were true. The text wasn’t there.

“Ethan, trust me, it was there. I read it with my own eyes. I probably lost it-”

“Ethan, I think you should go home and let her rest.” Owen interrupted. “She’s disturbed and that’s making her anxious. I think-”

“Don’t say this is a hallucination as well, I swear-”

“Skylar, he’s right.” Ethan cut me off. “We need to go home. You should take some rest and we can talk about it in the morning.”

I gave him an unbelievable look. How can they not believe me? Why would I lie about something so dangerous? I know for certain that I am not imagining things. They happened to me for real. If they don’t have evidence to prove my words, then that should only mean that the intruders were careful and knew every move of ours. And makes them even more dangerous.

We should worry about how we could stop them, instead of blaming each other. There won’t be time for us to regret it when they make another attack. Why can’t anyone understand that?

“Fine.” I said, giving up on them. “Let’s go.”

So we did. Ethan spoke a few words with his friend for a minute and led us both down the hallway. I stayed absolutely fine in the whole journey in the car and only replied when he asked me something.

“Where do you want to go?” He asked me.

“Home. Where else?”

“But you said you don’t want to stay there.”

“Well, it’s all just a hallucination. What’s the point in hiding from it?”

“Skylar, look at me.” He said, pulling me by my forearm.

I didn’t.

I simply stared out of the window.

I heard him sigh from beside me. Edging closer to me, he took my palm in his.

“Skylar, we’re not saying that you’re lying. We’re simply worried that we don’t have anything to fight against. We don’t have any lead. How are we ever going to investigate further?”

“Why are you giving me an explanation? This is purely a misconception. We have nothing to worry about, Ethan. Let’s wake up tomorrow and pretend nothing happened. This time someone will probably try to kill me, and you can all have the fun of saying it’s all a hallucination again.”

“Skylar, don’t talk about dying-”

“Oh, why not?” I said, facing him now. “That’s all I see. I receive messages asking me to be alert and save my life and you think I shouldn’t be worried? please, at least someone should be worried about me. I can’t live a pathetic life where even I’m not worried about my own self.”

“Why are you sounding like I don’t care about you? Skylar, I-”

“Please don’t tell me that you love me. This is not loving, Ethan. Don’t you see it? You don’t trust me. You don’t care about what happened. When something really happens to one of us, you’ll regret not believing me.”

“Skylar, if you’re right, why aren’t we able to figure out any lead. Owen is one of the best officers in the city, there’s almost no case that he went wrong in. If he’s saying that this could be a mistake, then probably we should look into it.”

“What if he is wrong? You can’t solely believe him over me-”

“I’m not believing you over him. I’m just believing what I feel is right.”

I kept staring at him long after he said those words. I didn’t know when my eyes moistened or when they brimmed with tears until they fell on my cheek. Ethan’s eyes softened at the sight of my crying. He tried to cup my face, but I pushed him away.

“Don’t touch me.” I said, “Please, just don’t say anything.”

“Baby, I.”

“Please.” I said again, as more tears fell on my cheeks.

Pain flashed across his face for a brief moment. He retrieved his hand and looked away. “Alright. But please stop crying.”

I sniffled and tried to control my tears, but they never stopped. It’s like one emotion nudged another and soon, everything was a mess in my brain.

I felt alone in this. Nobody was ready to believe me. They think I’m lying and much worse, that I’m imagining things. I probably wouldn’t have made a big deal out of it if things were different but it’s a serious matter. How can I not worry? Our lives are at stake here.

And what’s killing me more from the inside is the fact that Ethan of all people thinks the same. he doesn’t think any different about this situation. he just told me that he is believing what is right. That’s just implying that he thinks I’m wrong. The helplessness of this situation was making me want to churn all the memories out of my head.

I wish this never happened to me. I wish Ethan didn’t go to the office this morning. Or that he returned home early. We could’ve spent our evening in peace, and all of this could be avoided. Yet now, here we are. So close yet so far.

“Drive us to Skylar’s house.” He ordered the driver, “We’re going to spend the night there. And don’t tell anyone about where we are.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You don’t have to do that,” I said to Ethan. “I’m not worried about it now. We can go back home.”

“I don’t want to take any chances,” Ethan replied. “I know you’ll be more comfortable elsewhere. It’s better we stay somewhere else for tonight.”

“We’re bound to go back to our home once this is-”

“I’ll buy a new house for you if that makes you feel better.” He said. “Please, let me do this for you.”

“I don’t want all this Ethan. I just want all of this to end as soon as possible so we can get back to our lives and live normally.”

“That’s all I wish for too,” he said. “I don’t want all this either.”

“Then let’s not do this to ourselves. Please Ethan, what would it cost you if you believe me this one time? Worst case scenario, it’ll waste our time. That’s it. But if what I said turns out to be right and if one of us ends up getting hurt, then I swear, we will regret it for the rest of our lives. There’s a possibility that we might even lose each other.”

“Skylar, please don’t stay that.”

“It’s hurting me too to say that. But it’s fact. That’s always a possibility. Id don’t want to lose you Ethan. We just drew ourselves closer. I want to spend my life with you. And I don’t want to lose that chance this time.”

Ethan gave me a brief glance and looked away. He massaged his temples with his fingers and closed his eyes.

“Alright.” He said. “Let’s just wait for one more day, Skylar. We’ll see if they make another move. We’ll be alert and try to find a lead. Is that fine?”

I nodded at him. “Yes.” I said. “Let’s just hope it’s not too late.”

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