Page 1 of Mated to the Mountain Bear
1
ZARA
Something stirring in the dead of night wakes me.
It’s not the couple upstairs who sometimes fights until dawn. It’s not their muffled shouts and slammed doors that we all pretend never happened when I meet them on the stairs. Nor is it the sound of a car alarm or sirens blaring out on Pike Street.
It’s something else. Something quieter.
The radiator clanks and groans like it’s dying, which it probably is, but it’s not that, either. It’s something my brain is telling me to pay attention to.
The silence grows louder the harder I listen, but again, there’s nothing. Just the sound of my breathing, and a stillness that makes my senses tingle.
I lie motionless, eyes closed, trying to figure out what’s wrong and how to calm my racing heart.
The faintest kiss of a cool breeze touches my face, carrying with it, the fresh scent of rain.
In the pitch black, I try to make out the lock, the deadbolt I installed three weeks ago, to check that it’s closed. Not that I need to. I always lock my bedroom door now, same with thewindows, and I’ve checked them twice a night since the notes started appearing under my door.
Since my sister disappeared without a trace.
There should be no draft disturbing the air, and yet, lying here trying to force my breathing to remain even, I’m convinced I felt one coming under the door.
I close my eyes again, telling myself I’m being ridiculous. There’s nothing there. It’s just a bad dream, lingering, totally understandable with everything that’s been going on.
And I’ve almost convinced myself to just go back to sleep until a floorboard creaks in the living room, shattering any illusion I had of my home being a safe place.
My eyes snap open in the darkness, my heart hammering so hard in my chest, I can feel it in my throat. It’s been three weeks of finding those notes and a constant feeling of being watched.
You belong to me.
As the seconds tick by, I strain to hear over the rush of blood in my ears. It’s deathly quiet. Then, there’s the soft whisper of a door sliding open over the worn carpet in the guest bedroom and the faintest scratch as a boot scuffs cardboard, both as loud to me as an alarm going off beside my head.
The floor is full of packing boxes, my half-hearted attempt at packing, which left the place a mess; a tricky obstacle course to navigate, even with the lights on. A surge of adrenaline electrifies my blood, even as a cold dread settles over me. My body’s preparing me to fight because I’m not alone.
My hand slides slowly across the nightstand until my fingers close around my phone. I debate calling the police, but whoever’s in here will hear me speaking. The number I need, the number I should have called yesterday before packing a bag and fleeing, is already saved.
Lennox Private Security.
I should have pushed down that nagging self-doubt, the one that told me I was imagining things when I found my jewellery box open on the dresser. Nothing's missing, just rearranged. My grandmother’s ring turned backward. The white gold necklace Amber gave me for my birthday sitting in the wrong compartment.
I convinced myself I was wrong, that if someone had been in the apartment, they wouldn’t have left so many valuables behind, but I should have trusted my gut.
Carefully, I swivel in the bed, moving oh so slowly, as my brain frantically runs through all of my options, one more unrealistic than the rest.
If I run for it, they’ll catch me before I make it to the front door. I could hide in my bathroom and lock the door, but then I’d be trapped with no way out.
My internal panicking about what to do is disrupted by another sound. Soft footsteps move through the guest room, pausing beside the bed on the other side of the thin wall, before moving on.
They’re so close that I’m afraid to move, afraid to even breathe. My frantic mind conjures up an image of a shadowy figure looking at the picture of our parents that sits on the nightstand there. Just the thought makes me feel ill.
My eyes drift to the shard of light coming in through the gap in the curtains. The bedroom window is right there, just five feet away. It’s three floors down to the alley, but the fire escape is right outside.
The steps pause in the room next door as my mattress creaks, and we both freeze on either side of the wall, waiting to see what the other does next. Whoever it is, they’re listening for noise the same way I am, deciding what to do. It feels like I’m stuck in a horrible game of chicken, one that I really don’t want to play.
It’s now or never.
I throw off the covers and lunge for the window. My hip slams into my dresser, and I curse in my mind at the loud thud, but I keep moving. They heard that. There’s no point in trying to stay quiet now.
