135. Mark's Visit

Josh slowly returned to the chair beside her bed. His anger hadn't disappeared—but it shifted. Now it mingled with something colder. Something more calculated.

“Alright,” he said quietly. “We won’t tell them.”

Ashley exhaled, her body sagging into the mattress.

“But I will find out who’s doing this to you,” Josh added. “And I’ll end it. One way or another.”

Ashley closed her eyes, her lips parting like she wanted to say thank you, but no words came.

She just nodded.

And Josh sat beside her again, this time with purpose behind his stillness.

⨉⨉⨉

Ashley stood near the hospital room window, her arms loosely crossed over her chest, her shoulder pressing against the cold glass as if it might anchor her back into the present moment. The late-morning sun glared down over the sprawl of Los Angeles, casting bright angles onto the polished floor tiles and the foot of her bed. Far below, the city pulsed with its usual rhythm: cars weaving in and out of lanes, pedestrians crossing streets with coffee cups in hand, unaware of the storm that had shattered her sense of safety just days ago.

She hadn’t slept much. Not deeply. Not really. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw headlights. A blur of movement. The cold floor of the basement pressing into her back. The taste of blood in her mouth. She winced and hugged herself tighter.

Then came the knock.

And when she heard the door open, she flinched. Her body jolted slightly before she turned around. She jerked away from the window instinctively. Her body tensed, every muscle bracing. Her heart stuttered in her chest. She turned, her hand reaching for the wall out of pure reflex—a primitive need to ground herself.

The door started to creak open.

Mark stepped inside, his eyes immediately sweeping the room until they found her. Ashley stood by the window, the pale morning light catching in the strands of her hair. Her posture was still, too still—like someone trying not to breathe, trying not to exist in that moment. 

Relief flooded Ashley’s face. It softened her expression, dissolved some of the tightness that had been etched into her brow since the moment she woke up in this place. She didn’t know why, but seeing him make something in her feels loosened.

Mark gave her a small smile, tentative but warm. “Hey. How are you feeling?”

Ashley closed her eyes tightly, as if trying to shut out the weight of the question. She didn’t speak. Her gaze met his, but all she could offer was a small shake of her head. Her brow furrowed deeply, as though the expression itself carried the weight of the answer she couldn’t give.

"I came straight here after Claire told me what happened yesterday. The accident—Ashley, what happened?" His voice was soft but filled with urgency.

Inside her, everything was in chaos. A storm of fear and helplessness spun violently, crashing against one another in a relentless spiral. She was exhausted. Not just from the physical pain or the hospital walls that pressed in around her, but from holding it all together for too long. She couldn’t cry—not in front of Mark. She couldn’t fall apart and let herself collapse into the comfort of his concern. There was no space for that. There could never be. Whatever existed between them had always been bound by silence and restraint. There were lines neither of them had crossed, and Ashley was determined not to blur them now.

So she held it all in.

The panic.

The loneliness.

The terror that curled like smoke in her lungs.

She buried it all under the surface, like a bomb she’d grown used to carrying, one she feared might detonate if she let even a single crack show.

Mark waited. He didn’t push. His concern was evident in the way his eyebrows knitted together, in how he folded his arms—not defensively, but as if trying to hold his worry in place.

"That person… tried to hurt me. That person… finally actually realized the threat with real action." Finally, Ashley opened her mouth.

Mark’s face froze. "Someone?" he echoed, and then—realization hit. His voice sharpened. "So it wasn't an ordinary accident? What do you mean is the person who sent you the terror package? Are you saying that person caused the accident?"

Ashley gave a small nod, then paused—uncertain. Ashley just remembered that Mark also didn't know that he was being sent anonymous messages every day which were very disturbing and scary.

Her head shook slowly after. "I don’t know. I’m not sure. But yesterday—"

Her voice faltered, breath thinning, as if each word cost her something.

"There were two men. On motorcycles. In the basement of my apartment. They came out of nowhere and tried to hit me. The first time, I managed to dodge them, but they came back. They turned around and aimed right at me. This time, they didn’t miss."

Her throat tightened again. It hurt to speak, but she pushed through it.

"I thought maybe they lost control at first. That it was maybe a random accident. But the way they turned back… that’s when I realized. They weren’t just reckless. They were targeting me."

She looked down at her hands, trembling slightly in her lap.

"I don’t know if they’re the same people who’ve been sending the terrors. But all of this—everything that’s happened—it doesn’t feel disconnected. It feels like it’s coming from the same place. The same person."

“What happened after that?” Mark asked, his voice low. “Were you alone when it happened?”

Ashley shook her head faintly. “No. Josh was with me. We were just about to head to your place.”

A beat passed before her brow furrowed, and guilt flickered across her face.

“Ah—right. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you last night.”

The memory struck her just then—how the chaos of the night had completely derailed their plans. With everything that had happened—the crash, the hospital, the fear—she hadn’t even thought about the dinner invitation. They never made it to Mark’s dinner invitation. He must’ve been left waiting with no explanation.

Mark nodded in understanding. “It’s alright. I figured maybe your husband didn’t feel like coming and you hadn’t gotten the chance to let me know. So I didn’t wait long.”

He said it kindly, without a trace of blame. But the quiet concern in his voice said everything else.

Then, after a pause, his shoulders seemed to drop slightly, the gravity of it all catching up to him.

“But I never imagined… It was something like this.” He said quietly, almost murmured. He let out a slow breath, the kind that came from disbelief mixed with helpless anger. “That it was this serious.”

His voice dropped lower. “So this time… they did it right in front of your husband? His voice sharpened just slightly, the edge of tension cutting through. “They tried to hurt you—with your husband right there? Out in the open?”

It wasn’t just a question. It was outrage laced with disbelief.