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JAMIE AND HER SISTER had never really had a very good relationship, not until recently.
Even though Jamie was glad that she and Christine were on good terms now, Christine still wasn’t the person Jamie turned to first. It just wasn’t a natural reaction for Jamie to lean on her sister. It wasn’t so easy to get into the habit of leaning on someone she hadn’t been able to trust and confide in before.
But since Jamie had no one else to turn to, Christine was the next person on her dial-list.
While she waited for it to start ringing, Jamie’s heart beat in her throat. She was on the road and driving slowly. Her mind was on other things – she was struggling to process everything that was happening.
“Jamie!” Christina asked, sounding almost ecstatic to hear from her sister.
“Hey,” Jamie said meekly. “Can you talk?”
“I’m so glad you called!” Christine cried out.
“You are?”
“I know you always go on about how nice it is to be pregnant, how much you enjoy it. And to be honest, I’ve always thought that you were crazy. I mean, I’ve done all my reading on the symptoms and what it does to your body. You know, the mood swings, the cravings, the bloated business and the swollen ankles... It all sounds really terrible. Not to mention the fact that you are sharing your body with something growing inside of you. Growing. But now that I am pregnant I can’t believe how great it is.”
“It is,” Jamie said meekly.
“No wonder you want to do this over and over again. I’ll let you know how the second part of this journey goes, though. Maybe I won’t enjoy the whole waking up in the middle of the night to handle puke and bottles thing.” She giggled at her own joke.
Christine was clearly in a very good mood. And enjoying her pregnancy, which was something Jamie was glad about.
Really.
But there was so much to talk about and pregnancy and babies was the last thing on her mind right now.
“Christine,” Jamie said, trying again. “Can you talk? It’s important.”
“Tell her we chose the green and gray option.” Jamie heard Paul in the background.
Green and gray? Oh, Jamie had completely forgotten. Christine and Paul had both taken the afternoon off to spend time together decorating their baby’s room. Christine was just as eager to decorate it as Jamie always was, enjoying putting some artistic flair into it. Maybe it ran in the family.
“The green and gray sounds wonderful,” Jamie said. “But I really need to talk to you, sis. It’s serious.”
Finally, it sounded like Christine was paying attention.
“What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
Jamie shook her head, biting back tears, a lump in her throat that she hadn’t expected.
“No,” she finally choked out. “I need your advice. A shoulder to cry on.”
“You know I am here no matter what,” Christine said. “Talk to me.”
“I think I am being stalked,” Jamie said.
“What do you mean?”
Jamie explained what had happened at the store, about the call during her grocery run, and then the picture that had been stuck in her window.
“It’s scaring the hell out of me, Christine. I don’t know what to do. Or what to think. It’s really giving me a bad feeling. But I don’t want to take it and run with it, in case it’s not something super serious. You know... I’m worried that my feelings are getting the better of me, in the wake of what we already went through.”
“No, I completely understand,” Christine said. “But it’s not strange for you to be worried. It’s very odd. And I don’t blame you for freaking out, either. You have already been through so much. Have you spoken to Alex?”
“No, I thought I would call you first and see if you could make sense of it, or tell me that it was ridiculous and I was just overreacting. I didn’t want to bother him and make him worry unnecessarily.”
That, and she hadn’t wanted to tell Alex in case something went wrong. In case they ended up the way they had before – with Alex blaming Christine and Jamie and Alex nearly losing the great relationship they had.
“Okay,” Christine said and it sounded like she was moving to a different room. Perhaps away from Paul. Jamie was glad that her sister was taking this seriously. “I don’t think that you are overreacting. I don’t think that this is just a silly prank, and I don’t think you should stress too much about how this will affect Alex. You have to tell him, you can’t keep it from him. It sounds serious. If it turns out, by some strange series of events, that this is just a joke or something, then you can laugh about it later. But it will be better if you two talk about it. Fill him in. It will help you, too.”
Jamie nodded. Her sister was right. She had had a feeling that this was serious, and she hadn’t wanted to hide it from Alex. She had just been worried that she was overreacting. She was very aware of the fact that her fears, her nightmares about losing her children again in some way or another, were very close to the surface. And she didn’t want to ruin things when it could have stayed.
“Thank you,” Jamie finally said. “It means a lot to me that I can call you, even if it is with bad news that might cast a dark cloud over your afternoon.”
“Don’t even think like that,” Christine said. “You are my sister, we are family. We are there for each other. If I phoned you with the same thing, you wouldn’t hesitate to help me through it.”
Jamie nodded. Christine was right; Jamie would be there for her sister no matter what. It was wonderful to know that she had someone who was so serious about being there for her. And the fact that that person was Christine, the sister she’d never had a very good relationship with before, made it even better.
“Call him,” Christine said. “And if you need to, you can call me right back. If you want to tell me what he said or if you want to vent again, if you want to ask questions or cry on my shoulder or complain to me. Anything. Really.”
Jamie smiled. “I really appreciate it. I know you and Paul have your afternoon off and it means a lot to me that you’re willing to be on standby.”
“Always,” Christine said.
They ended the call. Jamie glanced in the rearview mirror to look at Rosie, who seemed to be fascinated by the mobile that had been fastened to her carrier. The entire conversation with Christine had happened over Bluetooth, which meant that Christine’s voice had filled the car. Jamie hadn’t worried about it affecting Rosie in any way, like waking her up, but now she thought about her daughter again.
And immediately felt guilty.
“I’m sorry, I forgot about you for a second, sweetie pie,” Jamie said. “Mommy is just a little distracted.”
Rosie had gotten a hold of the end of one of the soft toys on the mobile and tried hard to fight her restraints and get the toy in her mouth. Jamie smiled and turned her attention back onto the road. She was so glad that Rosie was too young to understand any of what was happening.
Just as Markie had been. Thankfully, despite all the trauma they had been through, none of her children suffered from it. And Jamie intended to keep it that way.
She pulled into the driveway at the house and before phoning Alex, she hurried to take Rosie inside. She made sure she was in a safe place, and then hurried back to take care of the groceries, bringing it all inside as quickly as possible. Jamie locked all the doors and returned to Rosie, taking her out of the carrier and putting her into her crib, with music and mobiles and everything else Rosie needed to stay entertained.
“There we go, I’m just going to—”
Her sentence was interrupted by a crash and the sound of shattering glass. Jamie screamed. Her nerves were fried. Rosie immediately started to cry, kicking her arms and legs, tears streaming over her tiny cheeks.
“Stay here,” she said to the baby, as if Rosie could go anywhere else. Jamie rushed out of the room toward the sound. In the dining room, the window was smashed. Wind blew in through the jagged hole and tugged at the curtains. Jamie walked around the dining room table, moving slowly, her heart beating a mile a minute. Carefully, she peeked over the dining room table. On the floor lay a brick. Someone had thrown a brick through the dining room window.
Jamie started trembling. This was no accident. And it was no joke. This time, it was serious – confirmation that someone was trying to get to her.
And succeeding.
Jamie pulled the dining room door closed and locked it before she rushed back to Rosie. She picked the baby grow up and rocked her, speaking to her until Rosie stopped crying.
When her daughter was calm again, Jamie fished for her phone in her handbag. She was a little worried to look at the screen in case there would be more missed calls from that same number, but there was nothing. Thankfully.
Jamie struggled to work her phone. Her hands were trembling so badly, she could barely press the buttons on the screen. It felt like she was going to have a panic attack. Her breath came in ragged gasps and she felt lightheaded.
This wasn’t the first time she’d experienced a panic attack. She recognized the symptoms by now.
It had been a long time since she had come undone at the seams like this, since she had been so absolutely frayed. The last time had been when Markie had been taken and no one had had any idea where he was. It had been terrifying, then, not knowing where her child was and what was happening to him. Not knowing if he was alive.
Since then, Jamie had managed to work through most of her fears and suppress them. After all, she couldn’t stay terrified her whole life. But, right now, it was back in full swing.
What if someone was after her children again? What if Rosie was in danger? The baby was only two months old; it wasn’t right that she was already being targeted when she had barely been introduced to the world.
Fear and anger collided with in Jamie, and she didn’t know what she felt any more. She could barely breathe, tears stinging her eyes.
She forced herself to take slow, deep breaths, in through her nose, out through her mouth. She had to think with a clear head, she had to be logical. Otherwise, who was going to protect her children? Who was going to be strong if there was no one else around?
Slowly, Jamie managed to get a hold of her panic. She calmed down enough to think straight. She had to call Alex. And then she had to call the police. After the phone calls and the photos, she might still have been able to only talk to Alex. But the brick was a threat. And the police needed to be alerted.
She had a plan of action. Now for the first step.
