I thought my apartment felt warmer than usual if someone was working on repairing the building’s AC unit in the basement.
“Thanks, Gia, have fun. Oh, and I left more food out if you want to grab some stuff,” I call after her.
She smiles on her way to the front door. “I’ll have Simon take a look. Thanks, hon.”
Simon is her middle child, sixteen years old, and has a bigger sweet tooth than I do from the way he pounced on some of the candy Callum delivered to my apartment. He for sure will be digging through the grocery bags I left out.
After waving Gia goodbye, I head back up the stairs. I’ve been going up and down these four flights of stairs for weeks now. Ishouldbe getting fit. Yet lately, they resemble a mountain that takes all my strength to drag myself up.
Every time I wander these hallways, building work is going on. Hell, someone was even looking at the elevator, and Gia said that’s been broken since before she moved in, and she’s been here years.
I came back from work a couple of days ago and turned around, convinced I was in the wrong building. Someone had painted the walls a pale mint color and buffed the hardwood floors to a glossy shine. And there was even a new noticeboard—with tacks.
Gia said she hadn’t seen tacks on that noticeboardever. Someone is fixing this building up, and if I had to put money on who, I’d say it was my scent matches.
Halfway up the stairs, my world tips sharply to the left.
I stumble and trip, grabbing the balustrade and clinging to it until I’m sure I won’t tumble back down the stairs. Breathing hard, I blink tiny white stars out of my vision as I sink onto the step and close my eyes.
Lightheaded and sick, confused and slow, I don’t know how long I sit on the staircase waiting for my dizziness to pass.
I know what this is.
The fatigue that’s been slowing me down these last few days was easy to shrug off as just being overworked and not getting enough sleep. But I’m crawling into bed, sometimes the moment I get home from work, and no matter how many hours of sleep I get, it’s never enough.
The doctor warned me it could happen. I told myself I was fine, but I’m not fine.
Bond sickness. That’s what’s wrong with me, and it’s only going to get worse as my heat approaches.
Knock, knock.
Shivering, I lever myself up from the couch with a blanket wrapped around me and cross my apartment to open the door.
As I squint through the peephole, I get a good view of an unfamiliar man in a navy suit and white shirt, holding a clipboard. Next to him is a dark-haired man with a reddish-brown beard in khaki overalls. I think I’ve seen him patching a hole in the wall on the first floor.
I open my door but keep the chain on it, just in case. “Can I help you?”
The man in the navy suit says, “We’re doing work on the building, and we’re here to log any maintenance issues that need to be repaired in your unit.”
“You’re the new owner?” I ask, scrutinizing him closely. Both are betas, which is a relief. I’m not sure how comfortable I’d have been letting an unknown alpha into my apartment.
“General manager,” he says, his tone businesslike but not cold. Efficient. “We’ll be working on all the windows in a few days. I’m assuming you also get a draught?”
I nod, relaxed that he’s who he says he is and is here to do what he said he would. “Yes. Give me a second to remove the chain.”
I close my door, remove the chain, then open it and step aside. “Please come in.”
They walk into my apartment and immediately get to work.
“We’ll be replacing all front doors,” the suited man says, surprising me.
“Really?” Frowning, I turn to look at my black front door. “It looks fine to me.”
“They’re not adequate,” he says, making a note on his clipboard.
It looks perfectly adequate to me. If they feel like I need a brand-new front door, who am I to complain?
The man in khaki overalls checks the water pressure at the kitchen sink, while the navy-suited man makes notes on his clipboard. They spot the leaky faucet before I can tell them about it. Then they move to the next repair they need to make: sealing up the holes near the trim, a common entry point for pests, the man in the overalls tells me.
