“Unfortunately, I am.” Then he looked at her imploringly. “So, can we forget about earlier in the plane when I was a total dickwad and agree to be friends?”
Friends with Romeo…
It would be difficult given how attracted to him she was. But more than attraction, shelikedhim. And more thanlikinghim, she feltsafearound him.
She rarely felt safe around anyone.
“Friends.” She nodded, extending her hand so they could shake on it.
The moment his warm, dry palm engulfed hers, goose bumps broke out across the back of her neck.
“So…” he said slowly. “Is there anything you’ve ever done that you’re not proud of? Something you’d be willing to share with me so I don’t feel like such an idiot for stumbling up here and whipping open my raincoat? Great friendships should begin on equal footing, don’t you think?”
Oh, there wasdefinitelya skeleton in her closet. A huge one. But it would stay there.
“Well…” She stuck her tongue in her cheek to distract him from what she knew was all the blood leaching from her face. “There was this one time when this drunk guy woke me up to tell me about his high school gang affiliation and pot habit, and I was really cranky because I needed my beauty sleep, so I ended up punching him in the throat to get him to leave.”
His lips twitched. “Copy that. Message received. Good night, Mia.”
“Good night, Romeo.” She watched him walk to the back door, and then urged him, “Be careful on those stairs. They’re rickety even when your footing is sure.”
He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but then closed it and simply nodded.
After he disappeared inside, she flopped back against the mattress, willing her heart rate to settle.This could be good, she thought.Thiswillbe good.
When a frisson of apprehension ran through her, she studiously ignored it.
Chapter 31
12:12 AM…
I’m happy.
It was a strange thing to realize at midnight while taking a leak, but that’s exactly what Wolf did.
Suffusing his entire being was a sense of joy the likes of which he’d never felt before. The kind of profound wonder that came from having spent the day making love to the woman he loved, then napping, whispering about childhood memories, eating ice cream in bed, and making love again.
Washing his hands, he studied his reflection in the mirror. His features were both shadowed and highlighted by the dim glow of the night-light Chrissy kept plugged into the outlet by the sink.
Amazin’, he thought.I don’t look any different, and yet I’m changed.
He remembered a quote by Carl Jung.“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.”
There was definitely a reaction,he thought, smiling like a dope.Chrissy and me…we’re like cesium and water. Explosive. And now totally altered so that—
Thump!A noise from the porch.
It sounded like Officer Parsons—the policeman who’d taken over from Rick Ryan for the nightshift, the first guy who’d stood duty outside Chrissy’s hospital room—had knocked over one of the rocking chairs.
Standing stock-still, Wolf closed his eyes and listened. It was an old hunting technique his uncle had taught him. When you take away one sense, the remaining senses heighten.
He heard thebuk-buk-ba-gawkof a chicken in the yard next door. Thebeep, beepof a scooter horn a few blocks over. And far in the distance, the music from Duval Street. Otherwise, nada.
Relaxing, he reached for the hand towel and thought,I should probably go see if Parsons needs anything.
He remembered well the times he’d had to keep tabs on a tango through the dead of the night or had been assigned a graveyard shift security detail for some highfaluting politician in a foreign country. What he would’ve given had someone offered to spot him something cold to drink or volunteered to give him a bathroom break to break up the monotony and help keep him awake.
After pushing aside the little curtain concealing the stackable washer and dryer tucked into a corner cabinet in Chrissy’s bathroom, he found his jeans and pulled them on. They’d been sitting in the machine for hours, so they were wrinkled as hell. But he didn’t reckon Officer Parsons would care.
