I spun around when Wyatt let out a low whistle.
He stood in the doorway to what I assumed was the bedroom. “I think I found the pets.”
He ventured across the threshold, and I crept after him, entering the dimly lit bedroom with cold apprehension slinking along my skin.
“Oh, this keeps getting better and better,” I said, fighting the urge to run screaming from the apartment.
Several large glass tanks lined the walls of Rosario’s purple-and-black-themed bedroom. Inside each tank was a snake with red, black, and yellow stripes. The biggest was maybe a little less than two feet long. Still, that was two feet too long for me.
I took a step back. “Are those things deadly?”
Wyatt moved closer to the tanks to study their reptilian occupants.
I, however, stayed put. Although I didn’t suffer from ophidiophobia, I didn’t exactly love reptiles and felt no particular urge to get up close and personal with them. Besides, I had to put a hand to the doorframe to hold myself steady. I was feeling a little wobbly all of a sudden, and it didn’t have anything to do with the champagne.
No, it had everything to do with the fact that I was now imagining one of Rosario’s snakes escaping, slithering its way through the building, and harming my sweet, beautiful niece. I’d once read a news story about a child getting crushed to death by a boa constrictor. And what if these things were venomous?
I clutched the doorframe harder, worried I might be about to lose my profiteroles all over Rosario’s parquet floor.
“Well, are they?” I prodded, desperate for him to respond.
He took a close look at the last snake and shook his head. “Nothing to worry about. They’re harmless.”
“How can you be sure?” I demanded, not at all ready to simply trust his word. “They’re so…”
“Scary looking?” Wyatt finished for me. “They do look similar to coral snakes, but these guys are scarlet kingsnakes. They aren’t venomous, and they’re harmless to humans.”
I would have sagged against the doorframe with relief, but I wasn’t keen to show any further signs of weakness in front of Wyatt.
“Are you a closet herpetologist?” I asked.
He laughed. “I went through a snake-crazy phase in my teens. Anyway, this explains the frozen mice and skinks in the freezer.”
I released my grip on the doorframe and wiggled my fingers to get the feeling back into them. “Snake food?”
He nodded.
I backed out of the bedroom, so ready to be done with this whole search thing. I’d had enough surprises and adventure for one day. Probably for the entire year.
But, of course, the universe disagreed with me.
Wyatt had just joined me in the living room when we heard voices outside the apartment door.
Chapter
Nineteen
We scrambled out onto the fire escape and shut the window behind us in the nick of time. When I chanced a peek through the glass, I saw Rosario enter the apartment along with Agnes. I quickly pulled back out of sight.
Wyatt was already making his way down the rickety metal staircase. He reached the lowest landing, where a drop ladder had to be released to extend down to the alley. Instead of bothering with the ladder, he crouched down and then jumped from the landing to the ground. He did it with such grace and agility that it was as if he jumped from heights on a regular basis, like maybe it was part of his hot-guy training regime.
Admittedly, the ladder looked like it would clatter when dropped, causing a commotion and probably drawing a crowd. Not something we wanted to do. We couldn’t exactly explain why we were on the fire escape without lying, and at the moment, I couldn’t even think up a good lie to explain it.
Still, my muscles were already starting to freeze up at the thought of having to make that jump. I slipped out of my shoes since high heels and metal grating do not mix well. Then, gripping my shoes with one hand and the railing with the other, I crept down one step, then two.
I stopped.
“What’s the matter?” Wyatt whisper-called to me from the alley below.
