Her heart full of panic and dread she quickly tries to grab her phone from her pocket and with her shaking fingers she drops it, not once but twice before she finally grasps it tight enough to turn the ringer off. She lets out a breath of air and holds her phone to her chest trying to hear footsteps or anything coming close to her again.
All she can hear is her heart beating in her ears very loudly. Surely anyone nearby would be able to hear it thundering.
After a few minutes she feels safe enough to stand from her position on the ground and to come up with a plan.
Rose decides to sneak back to the front of the forest, back to the gas station to check and make sure Cal and Ezra were both gone.
As she creeps up to the wood line a little while later, she decides to run up to the building and peek around the corner for a better look. They are both gone
Breathing a heavy sigh of relief she goes inside to grab a water. She walks up to the register and as she's paying, she can't shake the feeling of being watched. She looks all around her but no one is there.
Remembering the stranger in the woods who cloaked her in invisibility, she wonders if that woman is in here watching her. Or if it's someone else with the same mysterious power. At this point Rose wasn't sure where to go from here. Back home... back to Cal... Go with Ezra...
She shakes off all those feelings and decides against all of them.
Could they be looking for her still? Is she safe? Does she need a new identity? Rose's thoughts are going a mile a minute. But she keeps thinking about that mysterious woman and her child.
At this point, Rose decides she wants to meet with a psychic. There's too much going on and she needs to talk to someone who can tell her what to do, and give her some kind of direction.
She turns and looks at the cashier as she's about to walk out, "Excuse me, is there a taxi service here?"
"Yes ma'am, want me to call one for you?" Rose smiles, "That would be lovely thank you."
"Where ya headed?" She looks at the cashier again, "Honestly I'm not too sure. I think I'm going to stay here or go into the next town over and stay awhile. I'm overdue for a vacation." With that, she turns and walks out the door to wait for her cab.
Once it arrives, she climbs in. "Where to Miss?" She answers, "take me four towns over, to a nice hotel, no specific place, just not this town or the next one over."
.....
She dozes off in the backseat of the cab and sleeps fitfully. Hoping to have a pleasant dream visit her, but it doesn't. She can't even get a good sleep due to the bumpy roads in this hick town. She huffs to herself about taxes and why can't anyone decently pave a road. Someone is going to get a flat tire or concussion bouncing around like this.
"Excuse me Miss, we're here." Rose sits up and passes the man plenty of money to cover her fare and a large tip. She nods her head at him in thanks and gathers her belongings and walks up to the hotel he dropped her off at.
Once he's driven off and she can hardly see his car in the distance, she notices a city bus coming to a pick-up stop and runs to catch it. She lugs all of her stuff onto it and sits down. Her eyes are heavy but she knows better than to sleep on public transit. People are bad, and do bad, disgusting and illegal things.
At the next stop she sees another nice hotel and jumps off to go check in. The hotel staff are efficient and she finds herself in a room very quickly with all her belongings. She flips all the locks on the doors and doesn't waste a moment taking off all of her clothes and jumping in the shower to wash this confusing day off of her.
As she's washing her hair and finally relaxing under the stream of hot water she can't help but reminisce on how lonely she is. She lost her friend Cal today. Is he even the bad guy she's imagined him up to be? Did she run from him for no reason?
She turns the water off and looks at her reflection in the mirror as she climbs out of the shower and glides her towel across her body, drying herself off. She walks up closer and swipes her hand across the glass of the mirror and gazes thoughtfully at herself.
Why was this man promised her? Why does he want her? Or does he? He kept saying "it's not what you think". Is he rejecting her before he even has her? What a joke.
She walks out naked, slightly damp still and falls down on the bed. Just to close her eyes for a minute. Just one.
And within seconds, she's asleep.
Authors note: I promise to release a chapter tomorrow and will strive to release at least one chapter daily. ♥️