The Follower by Kate Doughty (ebook reader with built in dictionary TXT) 📕

at Rudy in the Range Rover. Jada laughs. “I think you have to go. But I’ll see you soon.” She’s smiling from ear to ear.

Amber spends the rest of the ride home feeling like she’s floating. She can’t stop smiling.

Until she and Rudy turn into the driveway to find their parents waiting on the porch.

“What is it?” Rudy asks, before he’s even shut the car door.

“Is Cecily—?” Amber asks.

“Cecily is fine,” Mr. Cole says, and when he smiles, it’s actually genuine. “She’s been cleared to come home on Tuesday.”

Amber feels a smile split across her face. Just two days from now. “That’s amazing!”

“Now, she’ll still be very sick—we’ll have to limit her exposure to light, and—”

Amber walks forward and gives her mom a tight hug. “I don’t care. I just want to have her back.”

“Me, too, sweetheart.”

But her parents wouldn’t be sitting on the porch waiting for Rudy and Amber if all they had was good news. Amber tenses, waiting for the “but.”

“Did the police find anything?” Rudy asks. “Have you talked to them?”

Mr. Cole shifts. “Actually, I called the police today to ask for an update on the case. They confirmed that the makeup brand had no other issues with . . . tainted makeup remover. They say that Cecily’s is a . . . targeted incident.” Mrs. Cole winces, and Mr. Cole pats her hand before he continues. “I asked if they had any . . . fingerprint matches, or suspects, but . . . they didn’t have much to report.”

“It’s been more than a week!” Amber says. “How can they have nothing?”

Mr. Cole shakes his head. “They said there were too many other prints on the case to make any conclusions. Cecily’s, ours, your friends’—they couldn’t find any complete prints that belonged to anyone else. It was a dead end.”

Or the follower had worn gloves, Amber thinks. Next to her, Mrs. Cole presses her lips together in that way that Amber has come to associate with her trying to hold back Cecily-based tears.

“So the makeup remover was definitely tampered with,” Rudy says.

Mrs. Cole nods. “But it was her go bag, so it could have happened around town, at that party you kids went to . . .” Amber and Rudy exchange looks. “Nothing triggered the alarm,” Mrs. Cole says. “So we have no reason to believe that we aren’t safe in this house.”

Next to her, Mr. Cole nods.

All Amber can think about is the shadow.

For a second, the four of them stand in silence.

Mr. Cole breaks the silence. “Hey, some of the furniture came in today—we have a real table! Isn’t that exciting?”

The false cheer somehow makes Amber feel even sadder. But she gives her dad the brightest smile she can muster. “Yeah. That’s great, Dad.”

Amber spends the rest of the day editing posts, but her heart’s not in it. She can’t get the makeup remover out of her head, can’t stop thinking about Cecily or the follower or the shadow. Eventually, she gives up and goes out for a run, but even then she can’t get everything out of her head.

When she gets back home, she’s starving.

Dinner is pizza again. For some reason, this just makes Amber think of Cecily more. They eat dinner in silence; Amber can sense that there’s something else their parents want to talk about. It’s not long before her dad confirms her suspicion.

“Your mother and I discussed it, and we’re going to move the open house up a week.”

A week? They still have so much work do to. And that is so close . . . Amber knows that they need to get out of this house, but at the same time, she can’t stop herself from thinking about Jada.

“Can we finish it in time?”

Mr. Cole nods, and Amber watches her mom reach over and squeeze his hand. “I think we can. But we’ll have to scrap some of the less critical renovations to the third floor, and we’ll have to stick to our plan to leave the attic sealed. Even with those cuts, it will take a lot, from all of us. You kids have been such a great help, and I don’t want to overwork you with construction and your online presence, but . . .”

“Cecily is going to need advanced treatment and cosmetic surgeries,” Mrs. Cole says. “We’ll be looking for a new place, near a good medical center, and we really think that the sooner the better . . .”

Amber nods. “Yeah. Of course.”

“We’ll help however we can,” Rudy echoes.

Mrs. Cole smiles gratefully. “I know you will. Thank you.”

After dinner, Amber and Rudy head into the living room to do something that Amber has been dreading. She takes out her phone to begin drafting the open house message and check on their last post. They had scheduled it to go up after they got back; it had been online for a few hours now, but Amber hadn’t checked it. Everything is going to be fine, she tells herself. It’s just like every other small post we’ve done. She tries to summon the same confidence she had when she was talking with Jada earlier that day. Her girlfriend. She feels a smile cross her face.

She opens the post. There she is, smiling, holding a paint roller: These walls aren’t the only thing changing color.

And there, beneath it. A comment. The comment is boosted to the top, kept afloat by likes and replies from their fanbase. It’s a variation on the Alex Grable name to circumvent the block, but it is doubtlessly them.

I have a surprise for you, too.

She gasps, and Rudy is over her shoulder in an instant.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Amber whispers. Rudy doesn’t answer. The follower doesn’t need to post the message over and over in order to be seen this time. The comment is instantly upvoted, liked, boosted so high that there’s no way the Coles won’t see it. Amber is paralyzed. Rudy reaches over her shoulder and clicks on the comments.

Stop bothering them!

Leave the Coles alone!