Thunderstruck (Ramsey Security #1)

I nod at her words, believing none of them. Outside on the patio, the two private security contractors speak quietly. Vern hired them after we noticed someone following us home from the store. Shelley said the stalker was likely someone from the press. My story interested people. The news ran stories about my abduction and escape. They played the videos taken by citizens when I ran down the streets to freedom. The tabloids weaved wild stories about where I'd been and how I'd truly gotten away. By refusing to tell my story, I'd allowed the media to tell it for me. As obnoxious as the attention could be, the media's stalking kept Locke from reclaiming his Rose. So far anyway.

Selfishly, I want to believe he'll find another Rose. After all, I'm not the first fake Rose or even the second. Locke refused to be careful with his Roses, leaving us broken and needing replacing.

I didn't dare think of the next Rose. Imagining another woman living her life, only to find herself enslaved, made me feel guilty for running. I had already been broken. Shouldn't I have lasted as long as possible to save the next Rose from my fate? Instead of being self-sacrificing, I allowed a single song from my past to inspire me to run.

The security men outside are retired police officers, and they always speak to me in hushed voices. I cry sometimes when they look at me. They scare me, but I creep them out too. The only time I've laughed this week was when Shelley teased me about scaring those big strong ex-cops. Tears terrify men, I told her. When Shelley gave me a knowing smile, I wonder how much she's gotten out of Vern by crying over the years.

I eat dinner at the table with the kids and Shelley. They talk about their day while I stare at my food. Able to eat whenever and whatever I want now, I often overeat. In fact, I plan to put on fifty pounds, maybe a hundred. If I'm fat enough, Locke won't want me any longer. Rose cared about her weight, Locke told me once. You care about your weight too, Rose.

I doubt he even remembered I wasn't the real Rose most days. For nine months, my sanity relied on a man who'd lost his decades earlier.

After dinner, I watch a Disney movie with the kids before bed. They sing along with the songs while I stare at the screen. I'm sweaty in my large gray sweats while Shelley looks healthy and comfortable in her blue shorts and tank top. I feel disgusting next to her. Yet my ugliness relaxes me. An ugly woman has no value to Locke. Despite my guilt over his next victim, I refuse to be Rose again.

Sleeping in a bedroom upstairs, I leave the door open and TV on. Downstairs, the family's housekeeper Mona walks around and her slippers slap against the wood floors. A few rooms away from mine, I hear John's TV playing quietly. In the other direction, Diana giggles while being silly with the cat. Even with everyone readying for bed, the house feels too loud.

Before crashing for the night, Shelley leans into my room and smiles at me. I smile back, but the dark scares me, and I can't pretend otherwise.

"Everything is locked up tight," she says. "Dan and Joe are keeping watch."

"I took a sleeping pill. I'll be fine."

Watching me from the doorway, Shelley worries again. Her pretty face scowling in the darkness, she's thinking I take too many pills. Shelley wants me to be the way I was before Locke stole me from her, but she's clinging to a fantasy.

After she retires to bed, I stare at the TV and think of nothing. I doze off to the sound of the dogs' nails clicking on the floor as they play in the hallways.

The first gunshot yanking me from a bad dream, I'm paralyzed in bed. Joe and Dan's yelling accompanies the second shot. I flinch at the sound of more gunshots along with the blare of the security alarm.

Tangled in the blankets, I roll out of bed and topple on the floor. Soon, I crawl into the hallway. Between the insanely loud alarm and the sleeping pill in my system, I can't concentrate.

"Aunt Darla!" Diana yells at me from down the hallway.

Diana waves me towards her mother's room where Shelley appears with John. My sister's terrified eyes look huge in the darkness. Even panicking, I can barely move with all the medicine flowing in my veins.

Crawling towards them, I finally lose the sheet wrapped around my left leg. I reach the bedroom door as the dogs do. Diana is already in the closet's panic room with her brother. Shelley helps me to my feet and yanks me towards the doorway.

As Shelley shuts the door and locks it, I wrap my arms around my shaking body. Next to me, John and Diana cuddle with their dogs. I wonder about the cat and Mona. At the control panel, Shelley looks at monitors while speaking to someone on the emergency phone.

"We're safe in the panic room," she says. "Our housekeeper is in the downstairs panic room. We're safe, but I hear gunshots."

"It'll be okay," Diana whispers to me.

John wraps me tightly in his little arms. "Don't cry, Aunt Darla."

The medicines leave me numb and unable to feel my tears. Locke will never let me go. He'd rather destroy me than know I exist without him. In his desperation to destroy me, he'll hurt everyone I love.

"I shouldn't have run," I whisper, but the children don't understand.