Page 78 of Take The Risk

​“About a week after her ex showed up for Lock’s first baseball game.” I remembered the day so damned clearly. It had taken everything in me not to smash his face with a two-by-four. Showing up at her house, acting like he had the right to be there, and bringing his pregnant mistress along? I cracked my knuckles.

​“You think he could be behind it?” Wade voiced the question that had been plaguing me since I’d found out.

​“Phoebe doesn’t think so.” I explained she’d had his whereabouts and Layla’s confirmed after the first couple of notes.

​“Doesn’t mean they aren’t a part of it. They may have someone else working for them.” Wade pondered.

​“Phoebe thinks it’s one person, acting alone. It’s something about the way the notes are written.” My scribbler had gone into a long lecture about writing styles, their uniqueness, and the way they told people about the writer. She’d been cute as hell, her face lit up. I’d had no idea writing was so technical or psychological. I was better educated now. “Her publisher is working the angle that it’s a fan who made the connection and decided to torment her. Apparently, they receive dozens of creepy letters and emails almost daily.” Some people were fucking nuts.

​Wade grimaced. “I’ll talk with her about it this afternoon and see what I can do. Given this new information, though, you two need to be extra careful. If someone knows Phoebe’s identity, and it’s not someone she’s familiar with, then they may be watching closer than you think. You don’t want them to expose your relationship, and they might if they think it will hurt her.”

​Great. Another complication.

Chapter 29

​“I hate this,” I growled against her lips.

​“I don’t like it either, but Wade is right.” She licked my bottom lip, sucking it between her teeth. Her arms wrapped around my neck. The feel of her breasts in the silk bathrobe barely covering her had my cock straining the fabric of my dress pants.

​Grabbing her ass, I squeezed her to me. “Let’s just skip it. I’ll spend the night eating your pussy instead.” She was my favorite meal, and because Lock had been home, I’d gone hungry for the last several days. At night anyway. When Lock was at school and Phoebe was home with me…

​Shaking her head, she argued, “It will be too suspicious. Do you think I really want to have to spend the night watching Olivia fawn all over you?” She shuddered against me, strengthening my resolve to talk her out of this. “It’s necessary. Wade made a good point a couple weeks ago. Not only will it make Cady-Jo more suspicious, but whoever is behind the notes may figure it out if we aren’t there and use it.”

​I saw red thinking about those notes.

​Wade had talked to Phoebe after church on Sunday, and she’d had copies of the notes from her publisher by Monday. My jaw ached for days after I’d read them. They were disgusting. Each one was meant to degrade Phoebe, to belittle her creativity and her work. Looking back, she’d been scared for weeks, and I hadn’t seen it.

​The only thing that allowed me to sleep even a bit on the nights I had to be home instead of with her was the fact that none of them threatened her or Lock physically. Still, I’d driven past her house more than once on those nights.

​Wade became adamant we keep a low profile when another note showed up at Phoebe’s house after the post-church get-together at Louise’s. Now, we weren’t just keeping our relationship quiet to keep my mother from losing her crap; we were keeping it quiet to keep Phoebe safe until her tormentor could be found.

​That made me feel a whole lot better about lying to everyone. I’d told Phoebe I was okay with keeping things secret, knowing it would be temporary. After seeing my mom at church and then spending time with her and my siblings, I’d started to feel the growing discomfort of what that meant.

​I’d comforted myself with the knowledge I technically wasn’t lying. As long as no one asked me a direct question, my not volunteering information wasn’t a deception.

​The letter had changed everything.

​Lying to keep my woman and her son safe was a completely different matter.

​It had taken me a solid hour to calm the fuck down when I’d gotten the call from Wade. He’d taken Phoebe and Lock home with the intent of talking to her, and I’d been roped into dinner at Mom’s.

​I’d bent Mom’s fork when I’d received Wade’s text. Wade, being a true friend, had called me shortly after texting, telling me there was a problem, claiming some kids might have messed with some of the construction equipment I stored out back, and asking me to come. Mom had questioned it, making sure Wade was there, going so far as to ask if I’d be staying after or leaving with him.

​It’d been on the tip of my tongue to tell her off. This was getting ridiculous. If I hadn’t been so worried about Phoebe and Lock, I would have had a showdown with her about her attitude. Instead, I told her I’d follow Wade’s direction if there was damage and I needed to file a police report. Again, it wasn’t a direct lie.

​I was a snarling, snapping mess by the time I got to Phoebe’s. I wanted to pack her and Lock up, moving them to Dad’s cabin where this psycho couldn’t find her. I was coming up with excuse after excuse to out our relationship; that way, I could claim her and Lock as mine. God fucking help anyone who messed with what was mine.

​Wade’s assessment was the only thing keeping me from doing just that. That and the pure terror on my scribbler’s face. Right now, the deviant felt comfortable. Confident. If we changed course and altered the perceived balance of power, it might cause them to escalate.

​In the meantime, she’d had a friend of Aaron’s come back out to install some discreet security cameras around the place. They had live facial recognition software which only alerted if a face she hadn’t authorized showed up and allowed for constant monitoring through an app. An app currently on my phone.

​All of this had led to tonight with me in a suit, kissing my woman goodbye as I prepared to escort my ex, at my scribbler’s insistence, to her grandparents’ anniversary party.

​“We can cancel. I’ll say I’m sick.” I hated the look I knew would be on her face tonight. It was the same stricken look she got whenever Olivia was around me. Not that that happened much, and not without someone else there. I’d kept my promise to Phoebe with pleasure. I’d already been annoyed with Olivia’s blatant antics before Phoebe became mine.

​“Ugh, no. You can’t.” Alex flounced into the room, her silver dress swishing with each step. “We need to make this look good. Someone is after my girl here, and you”—she pointed at me— “are not going to paint a bigger target on her back.”

​“Get lost, Barbie,” I snapped, not wanting a second I got to spend with my scribbler to be eaten up by anyone else. Despite my irritation at Alex for interrupting, I was glad she was here and going as Phoebe’s date. If there was one person I knew had my scribbler’s back more than me, it was Alex.