The wind blew across the sidewalk and flipped signs hanging on hinges in the picturesque little town. The sky grew dark as another wintery storm rolled in. Fawn pulled her cloak tighter as she hurried toward home and took another sip from her hot tea.  

     Garrett stayed far back enough that she wouldn’t notice him and so others wouldn’t know he was following her. He’d tracked targets for many years and knew how to do it well. Somehow, this felt different. Following a woman he knew who wasn’t the target of an investigation felt like stalking, and he wondered if he was making a mistake. 

     He worried about her. It was as simple as that. 

     He’d immediately believed she was some sort of spy sent to befriend Mr. Pinkerton, then upon learning she was his despondent neighbor, almost became convinced he was right. She was there to get close to them. Whether it was for agency information or about the Order, he wasn’t sure. 

     The thought was quickly driven away after discovering all Yuè said was true. He better understood why Fawn was so guarded with her personal information and her feelings. 

     When he watched the way the staff at the office treated her, his blood boiled. He thought of the words in the text and saw the heartache on her face. 

     When the man at the coffee shop teased her about her dress, then openly flirted with her, he could see she was at first hurt then uncomfortable. She never once smiled or responded favorably to his advances. 

     She was shy, even toward the two women who defended her. She was completely different from the women he knew, and he had the sense she was more fragile than she let on when they argued. 

     He'd become used to her nightly crying and wondered if it was a recent depression or something she’d lived with her whole life. After what happened at the party and then the shop, he worried her night would be worse than he’d witnessed that week since he’d returned. 

     Fawn stopped when she came to the entrance of a small park. She glanced around to see where most people were heading, and none were going down the path. Most of them looked pressed for time, perhaps returning to work at the end of their lunch break. 

     Garrett stepped inside the alcove of a closed down clothing store and pretended to look through the window. He looked straight through it to the other side to watch what she was doing. When she turned and headed down the walkway into the park, he carefully followed.

     The creaking of branches on bare trees echoed across a circular path that surrounded a large dry fountain. Leaves and needles on evergreens rustled among them, causing a mixed sensation of two separate seasons. Fawn stopped walking to listen. She closed her eyes and let the sound engulf her. She took a deep breath of the crisp air filled with the scent of the trees and snow. 

     A small snowflake landing delicately on her nose made her smile, and she opened her eyes to see a few more dotting the sky. 

     Garrett smiled with her and found a place among some of the fuller branches of pines to watch. The beginning of the snowfall was barely noticeable, but the flakes that fell on her black hair stood out in stark contrast. When she found a wooden bench to sit on, he sat on the one partially concealed by the tree behind which he stood. 

     He watched her look up to the clouds filled with unfallen snow and saw a small tear glistening in the corner of her eye. He took a deep breath and shook his head as he thought of the text Doug had sent while he was walking. 

     From what Doug had found after learning of her real name, he surmised she had no one in the world. She’d legally changed her name from the one the foster home gave her to the Chinese name Yuè Qiāo. 

     “Fawn” was what Mr. Pinkerton called her, but other than the office employee records, the name appeared nowhere else. He’d wondered if Mr. Pinkerton knew her story because the CEO would certainly have known the name was an alias if he truly vetted her as he said. Perhaps keeping her close was Mr. Pinkerton’s way of keeping her safe. It would explain why no one at work knew her by the legal name she’d created for herself. 

     He leaned back against the bench and crossed his arms as he continued to watch her. If his boss knew of her name, he must know the reason behind her secrecy. It meant Mr. Pinkerton trusted her, so Garrett decided to trust her, too. 

     A movement to his left caught his eye, and he watched a woman with a dog walk down a set of nearby steps. She turned right in the direction of the path that would lead her to Fawn. He looked over at Fawn and saw her notice the woman. She wiped her eyes and sat straighter in her seat. 

     The woman walking her dog ignored Fawn as she passed, but her dog did not. Instead, the large golden retriever stopped in front of her. His tail wagged so hard, his body shook. His tongue hung out of an almost smiling mouth, and Fawn giggled when he moved closer. 

     “Hello,” she said as she scratched its face and chin. “You’re beautiful.” 

     His long fur caught the rays of the sun and felt warm under Fawn’s affectionate petting. 

     She heard a loud huff and the dog whimpered as its leash was pulled rather forcefully. Fawn looked up to see the woman glaring at her and pulling the leash harder to make the dog follow. 

     Garrett watched angrily as the woman looked irritated by Fawn’s attention to her pet. He looked at Fawn watching the dog with sad eyes as it was taken away. Then, she started to silently cry. 

     “You can’t let her pet the fucking dog?” he mumbled to himself. 

     Fawn struggled to stop herself from crying. The feeling of being wanted at that moment, even by an animal, meant so much to her. Having it taken away as though she didn’t deserve it tore at her heart, and she fought hard not to cry the way she could at home.

     She cleared her throat and tried to dry her eyes. Grabbing her bag of food and her cup of tea, she stood and hurried from the park. 

     Garrett followed her all the way to their building, where he stopped and waited for her to go inside. He wrapped his scarf around his head, covering the top of it and bottom half of his face. He tucked his braided hair beneath his thick coat and turned the collar of the coat upward. 

     When he knew it was safe, he hurried to the elevator and rode up, hoping he would make it to the hallway of their floor before her. 

     Just as the elevator doors opened to the third floor, he saw Fawn quickly enter her apartment. Keeping his head down in case she was looking through her peephole, he walked quickly to his apartment and went inside. 

     Fawn shut her door just as she heard booted feet step from the elevator. She knew it must be Zhù, and she wasn’t ready to meet him. She looked out through the peephole as he was passing her apartment, but he was so fast and covered so well, she couldn’t see anything about him other than that he was tall. 

     She sighed and pulled off her clothes on the way to the shower while Garrett did the same. With her phone held tightly in her hand, she turned on the hot water and climbed in. While the water rose, she sat down and opened her text messages. She saw the three little dots already forming at the bottom of their conversation. 

     🗡️“Hi! I guess I just missed you. Are you okay?”

      She swallowed a few times before giving up her attempt not to cry. With a sob, she responded. 

     🥀“Not really. Today was a bad day. I want to talk but I don’t

           think I can.”

      He listened as she cried louder, her whole heart going into each sob.

     🗡️“You don’t have to say anything. I’ll be right here with you.”

      He knocked on the wall and she quickly rested against it, where she would cry herself to sleep.