the library far longer than I had intended, and I could still feel the hard, uncomfortable library
chair pressing into the small of my back. My brain hurt from the number of literary characters and
motives and plots Sabine and I had re-crammed in there, and my fingers had atrophied from
taking notes. The good news was, I was so tired, I would probably pass out in about five minutes.
There would be no lying awake staring at the ceiling and letting the cold, suffocating blanket of
loneliness overcome me. No obsessing about my tiny single and everything it represented. No
fretting about pills and X'd-out photos and other morbid gifties.But then, in the dimly lit, carpeted
Pemberly hallway, about five steps away from my room, a familiar scent tingled my nostrils. I
froze. My heart seized with fear and I tried to breathe through my mouth, but it was no good. The
smell was so strong I could taste it.
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Cheyenne's perfume. The sickly sweet floral scent of Fleur. It filled my senses. Someone had
sprayed it all over the hall.
No. No, not again. Not again. Of all the presents my stalker had left me, this was always the most
haunting, the most visceral, the most... Cheyenne.
I stared at the closed door of my room. Someone on the floor was listening to Bach at top volume.
My head started to pound along with the racing tempo.
Run. Just run. Don't go in there. Nothing good can come of going in there.But where else did I have
to go?
Trembling from head to foot, I stepped over to my door. Placed my hand around the cold
doorknob. I closed my eyes and said a quick prayer. That I was just imagining things. That my room
would be exactly as I had left it. And then I pushed the door open and flipped the light on in one
quick motion.
One look at what lay before me and I staggered backward. My vision blurred and I had to brace my
hands on my knees to keep from buckling over.
"No." The word escaped my lips. "No, no, no."
Somewhere on the floor a door slammed. Startled, I clung to the cold metal of the doorjamb and
pressed my hot face against it, my eyes wildly scanning my room. Why was this happening to me?
Why?
My bed had been stripped, the comforter balled up on the floor, the pillows uncased and tossed at