Chapter 41 Safe
Violet
The guest room at Camille’s doesn’t smell like anything.
That should be comforting.
Neutral. Clean. Safe.
But my body doesn’t understand safe right now. My body understands waiting. Like it’s braced for something to happen and hasn’t gotten the message that the door is locked, the system is armed, and there are two men with guns who watched us walk inside.
Camille’s spare bed is soft in a way my old mattress never was. The sheets are too smooth, the pillow too full. Even the hum of the heater feels expensive. I lie there staring at the ceiling fan that isn’t spinning, listening to the house settle.
Tick.
A pipe shifts.
Click.
The fridge changes cycles.
My mind turns every sound into a footstep.
I squeeze my eyes shut and force my breathing to count.
In for four.
Hold.
Out for six.
It doesn’t help.
The moment I start to drift, the security panel in the hallway beeps—low, polite, like it’s clearing its throat.
I jolt upright so fast my heart trips over itself.
From down the hall, I hear Camille’s door creak and her voice, muffled. “Violet? You okay?”
“I’m fine,” I call back automatically.
A lie that falls out of my mouth so smoothly I almost believe it.
Camille’s door closes again.
I swing my legs over the side of the bed and pad to the guest room window. I don’t open the curtains all the way—just enough to peek through the gap.
Streetlight. Wet pavement. A quiet neighborhood that doesn’t look like trouble.
And then—across the street, half under a tree—an SUV.
Black. Matte. Too clean.
It could be anyone.
It could be nothing.
Except I know it isn’t, because my skin prickles the way it did earlier in the lobby when that blocked number called and promised I’d be dead soon enough.
I stare at the SUV until my eyes water. It doesn’t move. No headlights. No door opening.
Just… there.
The air inside my throat turns tight and hot. I step back from the window like it might burn me.
Camille said I’d sleep better here.
She meant it. I know she did.
But my brain doesn’t register her apartment as safe. It registers it as a new place I don’t understand yet. Different locks. Different angles. Different shadows.
Different ways to die.
I rub my hands over my face and glance down at my new phone on the nightstand.
It’s absurdly sleek. The case is red. My name is printed on it in clean white lettering like it belongs on a desk in a high-rise, not in my trembling hand at one in the morning.
A phone like this doesn’t feel like a gift.
It feels like a leash.
I unlock it.
There are already contacts in it. Camille. Theo. Devin.
And Rowan.
Just “Rowan.” No last name. No title.
My thumb hovers over it.
I don’t press it. I don’t call him. That would be insane. I’m not calling my boss at one in the morning because I’m spooked by a parked car and my own thoughts.
I set the phone down.
The security system clicks again.
Not a beep this time—just a soft mechanical sound, like a camera shifting.
I freeze.
There’s no reason for it to move unless it’s tracking.
Unless it saw something.
Or someone.
I step into the hallway, barefoot on cold wood, and follow the dim nightlight glow toward the front door. The new security panel sits on the wall like a small black judge.
A green light pulses: ARMED.
Beneath it, a tiny icon of a camera.
I lean in.
A list scrolls on the screen:
Front Door — Secure
Back Door — Secure
Living Room Motion — Clear
Hallway Motion — Clear
Front Perimeter — Activity Detected
My stomach drops.
Activity detected.
My heart starts to pound so loud I swear the cameras can hear it.
I tap it.
A grainy still image pops up—someone outside, near the sidewalk. Not close to the door, not breaking in.
Just… standing.
Hood up. Hands in pockets. Facing the house like they’re counting windows.
I stare at the image until my throat aches.
A time stamp glows in the corner.
01:12 AM
I check the clock.
01:13 AM
So it was just now.
My breath comes thin. Too shallow. My head starts to fuzz.
I don’t scream. I don’t run. I don’t wake Camille.
Because what would I even say?
Hey, your expensive new security system just caught a faceless man staring at your house like he’s shopping for a victim.
Instead, I do the only thing I know how to do.
I swallow it.
I swallow the fear. I swallow the shaking. I swallow the scream clawing at my ribs.
And I go back to bed like this is normal.
Like this is just another item on a list.
I crawl under the sheets and clutch the phone tight in my hand, staring at the dark ceiling.
My fingers are cold.
My chest is hot.
I blink and blink, and the tears don’t fall. They just sit there, trapped behind my eyes like they don’t have permission to exist.
That’s when the phone vibrates.
Once.
A single notification.
My whole body goes rigid.
I look down.
Rowan: System is active. Try to rest.
I stare at the message.
Not because I don’t understand the words.
Because I do.
Because that’s the problem.
He knows.
He knows I’m awake. He knows I’m not resting. He knows the system just triggered. He knows there was activity outside the house.
And he texted me like it was weather.
Like it was a calendar update.
Like Try to rest is a reasonable thing to ask when a stranger is lingering outside your new address and you can’t even stop picturing your brother’s face.
I type before I can think better of it.
Did you see the alert?
The response comes too fast.
Rowan: Yes.
My throat tightens.
I type again.
Was that—
I stop. Delete it. Re-type.
Was someone outside?
Rowan: They didn’t breach the perimeter. They left.
My grip on the phone tightens until my knuckles ache.
How do you know they left?
Three dots appear.
Then disappear.
Then:
Rowan: Because I’m watching.
A shiver crawls down my spine so slowly it feels deliberate.
I stare at those three words until the screen dims and I have to tap it again to keep them visible.
Because I’m watching.
Not the system is watching.
Not security is watching.
Not we’re monitoring the perimeter.
I’m watching.
It should make me feel safer.
Instead it makes me feel… exposed.
Like I’m not sleeping in Camille’s guest room.
Like I’m sleeping under glass.
I force myself to type carefully. Neutrally. Like a professional.
Thank you.
A pause.
Then:
Rowan: You’ll be up early. Don’t spiral tonight. You don’t have time for it.
Heat flashes behind my eyes.
Don’t spiral?
Like my brother isn’t dead.
Like my mother isn’t half a memory on bad days and a hurricane on the others.
Like a detective isn’t watching me with the kind of eyes that don’t care if I’m innocent.
Like I didn’t just see a man in a hood standing outside my friend’s apartment at one in the morning.
I don’t type any of that.
Because if I do, it becomes real in a way I can’t manage.
So I type the only thing I can.
Understood.
A second later:
Rowan: Good.
I stare at that, too.
Like he’s training me.
Like my fear is a behavior he expects me to control.
Maybe he’s right. Maybe fear is just another inefficiency.
Maybe that’s why I hate that it’s under my skin.
I turn the phone face down on the nightstand and lie back, staring into the dark.
I should sleep.
I should.
But my brain keeps replaying that image from the camera.
Hood. Hands. Stillness.
And somewhere between one breath and the next, something else settles in my chest—something sharp and unsettling and unwanted.
Rowan Ashcroft doesn’t do anything without a reason.
He doesn’t give gifts without a return.
He doesn’t install a security system without a plan.
And he doesn’t watch a woman sleep because he’s kind.
He watches because he wants control.
Or because he thinks someone else is trying to take it.
My phone buzzes again, soft against the wood.
I hesitate.
Then flip it over.
Rowan: Front camera caught his face for half a second. I’ll handle it.
My stomach twists.
I type without thinking.
Handle it how?
The reply is instant.
Rowan: Go to sleep, Violet.
Not a request.
An order.
And I hate the way my body responds—like it knows what obedience sounds like.
Like it wants to comply just to stop feeling this raw.
I stare at the screen until it blurs.
Then I set the phone down, pull the blanket up to my chin, and close my eyes.