I crept into the hallway on silent feet and saw a large figure coming in the front door. The afternoon light blazing in the front windows backlit the figure to the point I couldn’t make it out.
I raised the umbrella, ready to strike, and let out a shout that was half scream and half battle cry.
“Whoa!” Bray said and threw up his arms. I came inches from hitting him with the umbrella. “It’s me!”
My heart nearly punched a hole right through me. I took a heavy breath and searched for my bearings. “What are you doing here, Bray?”
He wore a duffel bag looped over his shoulder. He held a set of keys in the hand he had raised like he was telling me not to shoot. “You told me to come over.”
Memory of our texting conversation fought its way back through the adrenaline screaming in my veins. “You could have knocked! You’re lucky I didn’t hit you!”
He quietly laughed and eyed the collapsed stick of black nylon in my hand. “With all due respect, that’s an umbrella.”
I shot a glare at him. “Do you want to see what kind of damage I can do with an umbrella?”
He visibly swallowed at the threat in my voice.
“Why do you even have a key?”
He paused and frowned. “Who do you think stocked your house?”
The realization landed like a stone on my head. Thought of Bray picking out groceries for me and changing my linens struck me as odd. It also put a curious warmth in my chest; he had obviously done it with great care.
“Oh,” I said, and tossed the umbrella on the coffee table, still a little rattled.
A few beats of silence passed between us.
He adjusted the strap on his shoulder. “So,” he eventually said, “it would be good to set these up facing the street. I was thinking one in the dining room and one in the bedroom.”
I thought of making a snarky comment about one at the front door to catch intruders too, but I kept quiet. Instead, I gestured to the dining room. “Be my guest.”
He still wore the T-shirt and jeans he’d worn to the park and on our fake date. I watched the muscles in his back move when he walked past me and lifted the duffel bag from his shoulder.
“Do you want something to drink?” I asked him, the words tumbling from my mouth.
He cast a look back at me. “Sure.”
I entered the kitchen and opened the fridge.
“I’ll take a seltzer,” he said before I even asked.
I smiled to myself at the thought that he knew what was in the fridge because he had put it there. I grabbed a silver can and tapped the top of it with my nails.
“So, did they, like, give you a budget and send you to Pottery Barn?”
He set the duffel bag on the dining table and unzipped it. “Something like that,” he said with a smile. He began pulling out a tangle of electronics: small circular cameras with little pedestal feet and dotted lights on their faces for night vision.
“Well, you did a good job,” I conceded and snapped open the can. I found a glass in the cabinet and poured it in.
“Thanks,” he said and took it when I offered. “For the drink and the compliment.”
“Mm-hmm.”
Something, perhaps his bulky frame in Saturday casual clothing standing in my dining room looking like a handyman come to fix my router, compelled me to keep probing.
“Is your house this nicely decorated?”
He pulled up the blinds a few inches to balance the smallcamera on the windowsill. Then he bent over so he was eye-level with it and left me staring at his back pockets. “I mean, I try, so I’d like to think so.”
