MrBallen

In fact, she had dealt with so many attempted break-ins at her own house that she had become convinced that she had a stalker.

She'd even put bars on her windows as a security measure.

So that's why Patrice did not like being outside.

She felt exposed, like her stalker or whoever it was that was doing this was gonna be watching her and would come over here and attack.

And so as fast as she could, she dumped the compost in her garden, turned around, hustled inside, and shut the door behind her.

And as soon as she had done that and was safely inside her house, she felt hugely relieved.

A few days later, on November 8th, at the market in town where Patrice typically got her groceries, a 55-year-old cashier named Cassie Koch rang up a customer at the register.

but as she bagged their purchases, her mind was elsewhere.

She was thinking about Patrice.

Cassie was typically the person that delivered Patrice's grocery order, but over the years, they had become closer than just a customer-provider relationship.

You know, they were friends.

In fact, these days, the two of them would speak on the phone fairly often, just to chat.

But now, Cassie realized she hadn't heard from Patrice in days, which was very odd.

both because of their friendship, but also because she knew it had been a while since Patrice made her grocery order.

And so Cassie had begun asking around at the store and had found out that nobody else had heard from Patrice either.

Now, Cassie knew it was possible that Patrice was just busy.

And for pretty much anybody else, you know, one missed order or even a couple missed orders wouldn't be enough to make Cassie worry.

But in this case, Cassie was extra concerned because she knew about Patrice's stalker.

And she knew that Patrice had even called the authorities about it, but there really hadn't been much help.

Remember, this is a tiny rural town in California that had experienced a lot of exactly what Patrice was experiencing.