Excerpt of Close to You by Christina Dodd

Kate's phone rang at two a.m.. Barely awake, she fumbled for the receiver, her heart pounding in her throat.

Was it Mom? Had they gotten Mom, too?

When she picked it up, no one was there. The line was open, but no one spoke, no one breathed. She hung up. She got up. Caller ID showed, “Private caller.” She dismissed the call as a mistake.

She got a drink of water and looked at herself in the mirror.

She hated this. One call in the middle of the night and all the fear and anguish of her dad's kidnapping came rushing back. All the memories paraded through her mind. They were nightmares come to life and no matter how hard she tried, nothing could erase them.

She went back to bed and an hour later, she had just drifted back to sleep when her cell phone rang. She got up and looked at the phone, but she didn't answer this time. Again it said, “Private caller.”

Coincidence, probably. A bad coincidence since both numbers were unlisted and unpublished, but a coincidence nevertheless.

When her home phone rang again at five a.m., she let the answering machine pick it up. A low, growly, disguised voice said, “Leave, bitch.”

And quietly hung up.

That day, to cover the dark circles under her eyes, Kate wore extra make-up.

Two nights later, she discovered a slap of whitewash on her car window. In shaky letters, it spelled out, Leave bitch.

Kate stared at the message. Her heart pounded in her throat. Her temples tightened with fear. She whipped around to look for onlookers, but none of the people who strolled past paid her any attention. Yet she had to face the truth. She had a stalker. She just didn't know what to do about it.

She hadn't yet had the nerve to call the police. Despite Brad's assurances about her work, there wasn't a doubt that every reporter at KTTV would love to see her fail. If she announced she had a stalker, she'd be regarded as a grandstander and the laughter that went on behind her back would turn around to blare in her face. She couldn't bear to make things worse.

Yet Kate knew the facts. She knew that stalkers loved to target the “girl” reporters. Stalkers were unstable, and although hers hadn't done anything violent yet, the incidents were likely to escalate to serious crimes — to rape and murder.

More important, she was afraid all the time. She suspected everyone.

The Hispanic man — he knew how to frighten a woman with a glance.

Senator Oberlin — something about him had made her uncomfortable, and he'd conveniently come to her rescue in the parking lot. Perhaps he'd arranged to have the tire slashed so he could approach her.

That other reporter, Linda — she was jealous and spiteful.

Brad, Cathy, everyone Kate met, every teenager who toured the capitol and recognized her as a broadcaster, every man who looked her over and flirted.

Even now, with the sun barely setting toward the west, she glanced behind her as she crossed the street behind the capitol complex. She had never been like this before, and she knew that, laughter or no laughter, mockery or no mockery she had to contact the police. Now. No job was worth dying for.

As she crossed the white line in the middle of the road, she heard a motor rev, tires screech. A gray car careened around the corner — straight toward her.

She dove toward the sidewalk. She landed hard. She rolled, frantic. Panic scraped her mind with sharp claws. Get away! He's after you!

But the car kept going. It wavered from one side of the street to another, out of control, almost overturning. Then it righted and its tires threw up a pall of black smoke as it raced away.

Kate didn't know if she'd been hit or just landed hard. She didn't know if she could get a breath. She sprawled on the sidewalk, her palms skinned, her pants torn at the knee. She blinked as black specks darkened her vision.

“What the hell…?”

Kate heard that sharp, impatient voice and lifted her head.

Linda knelt beside Kate, her dark eyes flashing with impatience. “What just happened?”

“Someone tried to hit me.” Crimson splattered the sidewalk beneath Kate's head. She touched her chin and her fingers came away covered with blood.

“Don't be dramatic.” Linda pulled out her cell phone. As she dialed 9-1-1, she said, “Whoever did it was probably drunk.”

Pain was starting to seep through Kate's shock.

“I couldn't see the driver, the windows were tinted,” Linda must have connected with the operator, for she said into the phone, “I need an ambulance on the corner of Fifteenth Street and San Jacinto. There's been a hit-and-run—“

“No.” Kate shook her head heavily. “No. This was no accident.”

Slowly Linda pulled the phone away from her ear. “What do you mean?”

“I've got a stalker.” Kate finally admitted it aloud. “I've got a stalker.”