Christie Ridgway: The Love Shack

Her phone went quiet and, letting out a sigh, she slumped back in her chair. If these were her last weeks at the cove, then she wanted to enjoy them as best she could with the pen pal who would be on his way again soon. She’d hide her weakness, her unruly responses and anything else that might reveal too much.

On another sigh, she let her head rest against the seat cushion and wrapped her fingers around her phone. It felt warm to the touch, and she tightened her hold on what seemed like a tangible connection between herself and Gage. Maybe it was dangerous to want to hold even such a small piece of him. After all, she knew he wasn’t going to stay. But then she didn’t have what it took to follow up on the ache she had for him, anyway.

What if he’d arrived last summer? she wondered.

But he hadn’t, and perhaps that was a boon. Perhaps this poignant pain served to underscore how futile it would be to care for a man who would never settle in one place. With one woman.

Maybe she dozed. She must have, because she was suddenly alert, heart galloping in her ears. The phone had fallen from her lax fingers to the desk. Was that what had woken her?

Her breaths were unsteady and loud in the room. Outside the office, the ocean spoke shh shh shh, and she struggled to heed its warning. Something was tickling at her primal brain and she carefully moved her head to look about.

All seemed normal, these four walls still her safest haven.

It was just her skittery nerves, she told herself. Keep it together. Breathe through the anxiety. Don’t be such a ridiculous goose.

It was still summer and she couldn’t afford to let the fear get the best of her so soon.

Then a new noise came from outside. It was a scraping sound. Maybe metal against wood? Like someone prying at the locked door.

Someone was trying to get in!

Her brain screeched the words in her head, and her flesh went cold. Rigor mortis seized her muscles as her gaze glued to the entrance. There was no inward sign of tampering, but that noise came again.

Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.

This time, she lurched out of the chair. Her half-paralyzed body moved with clumsy jerks as she Frankenstein’d toward the bathroom. She could lock herself inside there, she thought in urgent panic. There was a hook and an eyebolt—

—that wouldn’t stop anyone.

She knew it wouldn’t stop him.

Frozen again in fear, Skye stood in the middle of the office as horror dried her mouth and seized her lungs. That other night, she’d managed one scream before his hand had been there, fleshy and foul with bitter sweat, and then he’d gagged her with a kitchen towel. Later, she’d realized she could have yelled until she was hoarse and it wouldn’t have mattered. It had been off-season and there was no one near enough to hear her over the ceaseless surf.

Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.

The sounds grated against her hypervigilant nerves. Skye’s skin twitched and she stared down at her feet. Move, she commanded them. Move!

Move where? a dull voice in her head countered, resigned to what she’d been dreading all these months. He’ll just find you. He’ll just touch you again. He promised he’d finish what he started.

And then she thought of the last man who had touched her. It wasn’t him, that disgusting bastard with his stinking sweat. It had been Gage, dancing with her at Captain Crow’s, making her feel like a normal woman for the first time in a very long while.

Gage. Gage!

She found herself by her desk, unaware of how she’d made it there. Snatching up the phone, she fumbled with the buttons. The screen lit, and then she managed to tap Call. His voice sounded in her ear.

Relief and fear made her head spin. “I’m at the office,” she choked out. “I need you.”

“What?” he said. “Skye?”

She swallowed, and then revealed everything she’d vowed to keep from him. “I don’t feel safe. Help me.”

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