June
It’s been three days.
The first time I walked away from my scent matches, I’d have run through fire to escape them forever.Thistime, it hurts.
But I need to be sure. Surer than I have ever been about anything. I can’t build a future with people I don’t trust or can’t forgive.
The last three days have been ordinary. I go to work. Manny didn’t fire me for disappearing mid-shift because he’s desperate to keep staff and can’t keep his hands off them.
I read in the news that cops found Wilke’s body in William’s basement, and they weren’t looking for suspects in his death. They must think William killed him, or Lottie told them his death was self-defense.
No cops have tried to arrest me for his fall down the stairs, likely the result of the attorney in an expensive-looking three-piece suite that Callum hired, who came to my apartment. Callum called to tell me he was coming, and I just had to sign a prepared statement. He’d already gotten it from Callum. I agreed everything happened the way he said it did, signed where he pointed, and he left with the police officer who’d accompanied him.
Between continuing my fruitless search for my sister, I go to the laundromat, clean my apartment, or hang out with Lucia or Jack.
Music drifts from Gia’s door more than I used to hear it before.
When Callum bought this building, he didn’t just reduce my rent; he slashed everyone else’s. With lower rent, Gia has savings for the first time in years, and she no longer has to work every hour of the day to make ends meet. She can spend some of those hours playing with her kids.
Sometimes when I’m coming home from work, I hear her laughing with her kids, and it always makes me smile.
Zara, a young single mom of one, moved into what was once Callum, Torin, and Archer’s apartment the other day. She had so many boxes and an excited six-year-old boy running circles around her. I don’t want to imagine how she’d have moved in without a working elevator.
I introduced myself, and between Jack and me, we got all the boxes situated in the right rooms. Jack, who met her at the local community center, had told her the apartment was available when he found out she was living in a not great area with a not great landlord.
I told my scent matches I needed time to figure out what I wanted, but I never expected they would move out of the apartment. That had hurt more than I thought it would.
I’m back to living the simple life I built for myself, but it’s not enough. It feels like something is missing. Something I don’t want to live without.
A knock sounds on my door as I’m staring into my refrigerator, trying to decide what to cook for dinner. The problem isn’t that I have an empty refrigerator; I have too many options. That, and I’m a crap cook, so if it isn’t fast or easy, I don’t even attempt it. There are only so many times you can burndinner before you realize the problem isn’t the recipe; it’s the cook.
I go to answer the door, first peering through my peephole.Huh. Curious, I swing open the door to the same delivery guy back when I was too afraid to open it.
“Hi. I didn’t order anything,” I say, frowning.
“I just deliver,” he says, offering me a clipboard to sign.
I sign where he points, and he hands me the medium-sized box wrapped in brown paper and tied with a string. It has my name and my address.
June Edith.
“Looks like you’re settling in okay,” he says, glancing into my apartment.
I’ve slowly been decorating. A cushion here, and a candle there. Just a few things to make the space feel more homey. “I am, thanks.”
He leaves, and I close the door, wandering over to my couch to open the package.
Out of the corner of my eye, I spy something moving under my dining table.
My heart leaps, because it will always leap when I see a roach, but I set the parcel on the coffee table and head to the kitchen, where I grab a glass and a takeout menu.
I put the glass over the roach, slide the paper under it, carry everything to my window, open it, and toss the roach out. And I make a mental note to let Jack know that I might have another hole in the trim, and need the pest guy to come back and seal it. Then I wash the glass, toss the menu in the trash, and head to my couch to open my curious parcel.
As I pull the twine, the brown paper slowly unravels, revealing a brown cardboard box. After taking out all the packing paper, my curiosity grows at the sight of a gorgeousmedium-blue leather-bound book. I pick up a white folded piece of paper with my name written in a messy masculine scrawl.
I open the paper and read.
June,
