“But… the way she described it in such a vivid way, a guy in her room.” I shake my head. “It was sospecific. She was shaking when I went to her last night. Goodness knows where she got that from.”
“Poor baby. She just needs to get used to everything, that’s all, get all of her toys unpacked and everything in its place.”
“It’s your turn tonight, if it happens again.”
She grins, leaning over to give me a peck on the cheek. “But she always shouts for you when she’s scared. Always for Daddy.”
“Only because you trained her to.”
“And you dosucha good job.” She unplugs her mobile from where it’s been charging on the counter, glancing distractedly at the screen.
“Don’t suppose you got a reply, did you?” I indicate her phone. “After you left the message?”
She’s scrolling something on the screen.
“What message?”
“Last night,” I say. “The number you found in the little flip phone?”
“No. Nothing.” She slides the mobile into a pocket, picks up her cup of coffee again. “So, what have you got on at work today? Any chance you can get away early?”
I start clearing the breakfast things. “Just got a couple of meetings later, a report to finish.” A twinge of guilt at how easily the lie comes. “I’ll get off as early as I can, get some more jobs done around the house this evening.”
“And would those jobs, by any chance, involve you disappearing into your secret hideaway on the top floor again?”
“No.”
“You sure?” She raises an eyebrow. “Because I know what you’re like, Adam Wylie.”
“WhatamI like?”
“A dog with a bone.”
I shrug, glad to steer the conversation away from the topic of my job. “Don’t you think it’s interesting though? No one’s been in there for years; it’s like a little time capsule, perfectly preserved.”
“Interesting to the last owners, maybe. I’d rather have the extra space in that bedroom.”
“But it’s a weird thing to leave behind. And the way those things are all in individual drawers, like it might have been a kid’s playroom or something. It’s our own little mystery.”
I’ve always liked to know how things work, to get inside them and understandwhateach part did,whyit was there. As a boy, I’d driven my parents mad by taking things apart, trying to figure them out—I had raided my dad’s toolbox more times than I could remember.
“Juststuffthough, isn’t it?” Jess flashes me her smile, the one that still makes me feel like the luckiest man in the world. “And we have more than enough stuff already. Unless you’ve actually found a mysterious wardrobe that leads to Narnia up there?”
“Sadly not.”
“Or an original manuscript of Shakespeare’s lost play?”
“Nope.”
“Maybe an old skeleton bricked up in the wall?”
I return her smile. “Just a chair and table and an old Welsh dresser with a few bits and pieces inside.”
“Well then, I’d say we both need to crack on with unpacking and getting the house straight.”
I knew she was right—there were a million other things we needed to do to get the house in livable condition before we even started on the decorating.
“And anyway,” she says, “we need to make space for the new furniture.”
