Chapter Four: The Stranger Returns.
399 Words
She held her breath all morning, hoping she was wrong.
But just past eleven, he appeared.
Eva was tying a ribbon around a bouquet when a voice from the past slid through the air, soft but sharp.
“Still making things beautiful, Eva.”
She looked up.
Mark.
Older now. Sharper. His hair was shorter, his jaw dusted with stubble. But the eyes, Those eyes were the same.
She froze for a second.
Then, like muscle memory, she masked it—her face calm, her hands steady.
“Mark.”
His smile widened like it belonged there. “I heard you were back. Thought I’d stop by.”
She didn’t answer. Her fingers kept working, wrapping stems, tying knots.
“You always did like flowers,” he said, brushing his hand over a rose. “Strange choice for someone who’s… lost so much.”
Her eyes snapped up.
He tilted his head, amused. “I mean, after what happened with all those men. Terrible luck, huh?”
Her hands stiffened around the ribbon.
“You didn’t come to buy anything,” she said, voice flat.
“No,” he said smoothly. “Just visiting old friends. Seeing how they’ve bloomed.”
Still, he placed a twenty-dollar bill on the counter.
“For the memory.”
Then he turned and walked away, slow and deliberate like he owned the air around him.
Eva’s stomach turned. Her knees weakened.
He knew.
And he wanted her to know he knew.
He was back.
She closed the stall early that day. Couldn’t pretend anymore.
Philip found her later, sitting in her backyard beneath the old lemon tree. Her knees pulled to her chest, eyes vacant.
“He came to the stall,” she said as he crouched in front of her.
Philip stiffened. “Who?”
“Mark. It’s him. He hasn’t changed. He knew about the others. The way he said it… he was toying with me.”
She wiped her eyes roughly. “He wants me to be afraid.”
Philip’s jaw clenched. “We need to go to the police. Now.”
But Eva shook her head. “It won’t stop him. He’s careful. He plays in shadows—no proof, no fingerprints. That’s how he’s lasted this long.”
A beat of silence.
Then Philip’s voice came low, steady.
“Then we catch him at his own game.”
- Writer
