Obsession: Callie Douglas, Book One

Chapter Twenty-Six

Gabe's directions were good, and I only got lost once. That's a miracle for me, as I could get lost in my own bathroom if I put my mind to it. I've no sense of direction and normally rely heavily on the GPS system in my car.

One of the things I realized when I was shopping was that the end of July appeared to be a good time for shopping for household items. The first store I went to had sales on, and I was able to purchase a similar duvet and nicer cover for half the cost that I had been looking at the previous night, a couple of extra blankets, pillows, and two new sets of 1000 thread count sheets, again at half the cost of the 600 thread count sheets I currently had on the bed. I replaced my shattered dishware with a nice set of pottery dishes and hand-blown glasses that suited the artsy side of my personality, and with the money I saved through their amazing sale prices I bought a new area rug for the living room and medium weight white linen curtains for the bedroom as well as similar curtains in black for the living and dining rooms.

As I got in line to pay for my purchases, I heard "hel-lo there, Doc" from behind me. I turned, seeing Harold Hanson grinning as he juggled a new set of sheets in his arms.

"Hi, there!" I said. "How are you today?"

"I'm fine, thanks. How are you?"

"I'm fine. I see you're doing some shopping."

"I needed to buy a new set of sheets. The ones that my wife and I currently have are severely stained. They aren't getting clean any longer when we wash them. So, when we saw sheets advertised at such a good price, we thought we would get some more. You're doing some shopping as well."

"I am. I had a problem yesterday at my place. Someone broke into my home and ruined a lot of my things. I'm here to replace them."

Harold sounded shocked. "That's terrible. I hope they catch whoever did it."

I shuddered. "So do I. It's not nice coming home to find your place trashed."

"I'm surprised you haven't called me yet."

I looked at him, surprised. "Why is that? I told you I wasn't going to call you."

He grinned. "We'd have a good time. I could take your thoughts away from your ruined apartment."

I thought over our conversation, trying to remember if I'd mentioned that I lived in an apartment. Lucky guess, or did he know something? "Thank you for the offer, but I don't think that anything would be able to take my thoughts away from my apartment." My turn at the cashier came up, and I moved my cart up to the counter, unloading my purchases to allow the cashier to check my items through. Finishing, I moved all my purchases back into the cart, paid, and saying goodbye to Harold, left the store.

As I was maneuvering the cart over to the car, I heard the ping of an incoming text message on my phone. I ignored it, instead looking at the smallness of my car in comparison to the largeness of my area rug. I wasn't sure how I'd get it home. With resignation, I took out my phone to call Gabe. Just before I hit speed dial, I checked my text messages. There was one, from a number I didn't recognize, that said, "I know the junk in your trunk is on fire for me. I will come for you soon."

Just as I read it I heard a pop and smelled a noxious burning smell. I looked at my car. Smoke was starting to wisp out of my trunk. I hit speed dial and called Gabe.

"Callie, how are you?"

"In trouble. My car is on fire and I've a rug I can't get home."

"Hold on a minute. Did you say your car is on fire?"

"Yes."

"Did you call the fire department?"

"No. I just sort of shut down and called you. I received a text, then my car popped, and now there's smoke pouring out of it." I was starting to shake and the fact that I was really close to losing it showed in my voice.