“A better death than the stairs,” she grumbles, glaring at the remaining stairs she has to walk to get to her apartment.Then she nods and admits, “Some women die for love. I’m apparently destined to die because I had to walk up stairs without a burger.”
Biting the inside of my cheek, I decide to help the woman out, bending at the knees and scooping her into my arms before she can protest. With the way she’s bitching about the stairs, I can’t actually imagine she would. I’m proven right when I start walking up the stairs with her in my arms, and she sighs and drops her head back, falling limp in my hold as she breathes, “I’m saved. Glory hallelujah, the stairs won’t take me tonight.”
Laughing, I ask, “Why are you on your own, anyway? That’s not safe, Mads.”
She starts swinging her legs, hooking one arm around my neck and playing her fingers through the hair at the nape of my neck as she drunkenly answers, “The girls saw me to the elevator, but I told them to go. Not because I didn’t want to admit I didn’t know how to use the elevator. No sir-ee.”
It was definitely because she couldn’t use the elevator.
Snorting, I carry her to her front door, watching as she delves into her purse and rummages for her keys. A small pinch of sadness hits me then, because I noticed she started locking her door the night she didn’t show for dinner. She’s done it every day since, truly locking us out, and I still don’t know what the hell happened for her to ghost us.
Taking her keys gently, I unlock the door and step inside, kicking the door shut behind myself. Without a word, I carry Maddie to her couch and place her down like she’s a work of art I’m cautious of breaking, right before heading to the kitchen to get her a glass of water.
When I return, I find her sprawled on the footstool like a starfish, her spaced-out eyes staring up at the ceiling with a tilted head and a look of awe on that gorgeous face. Her nextwhispered string of words has me biting back another grin. “I didn’t know my ceiling moved. Did you?”
“Not a clue,” I answer, stepping close and cupping the back of her head to lift her into a seated position, pressing the cool glass of water to her plump lip that almost distracts me. “Here, have some of this.”
She does as she’s told, tilting her head back and gulping down the water like she’s spent a month in the desert, and I have to stop her from chugging down the whole thing in case it makes her sick.
Breathless, she nods. “That’s some good shit right there. Good shit, indeed.”
Grinning at her, I ask, “How much did you even drink, mayhem?”
Her face scrunches like she’s thinking hard about it before she shrugs loosely and admits, “I stopped counting after the fifth fruity concoction Zelda put in my hand. Your guess is as good as mine. Could be ten, could be a hundred. Well, actually, no. I’d probably die after a hundred. That’s still a better death than the stairs.”
She sighs like she’s been hard done by after climbing all those stairs, and it makes me wonder what time she actually got home and just how long it took her to get to where I found her.
A thought that’s forgotten when she suddenly yawns and flops back down with her usual dramatic flair that I’ve grown pretty addicted to over the months. Eyeing the little enigma, I pat her knee and tell her, “Stay put. I’ll get you clothes to change into.”
“Sir, yes, sir,” she slurs, dropping an arm across her face before falling silent.
Nodding to myself, I stand and head toward Maddie’s bedroom, heading straight for her closet. I rummage through a few drawers, finding a pair of comfortable shorts I know shelikes to lounge in and a soft band T-shirt she can sleep in, carrying them back to a quiet Maddie still lying on the footstool awkwardly.
I know she’s not asleep, because she’s humming a tune under her breath, her hand bobbing along to the beat. So, I step to her side and hover her clothes in front of her face. “Wanna get changed into something comfier before going to sleep?”
Her hand falls away and her gaze meets mine, my heart stalling in my chest not for the first time. There’s something in her eyes that bleeds the humor away from my body, and I crouch beside her slowly, her eyes tracking every move as though she hasn’t been drinking her body weight in cocktails all night.
Keeping my voice hushed, not really wanting to disturb the peace I feel when I’m in her space, I ask, “What’s going on in that head of yours, Maddie?”
Those piercing blue eyes scan me, an awareness in those depths that fights through the drunk haze that keeps her head swaying, and she grumbles, “I missed you guys.”
My shoulders slump and I crouch beside her, tucking more of her hair from her face. She watches me as closely as she can manage, pouts, and crosses her arms over her chest just as I ask, “You wanna tell me why you locked us out?”
She shakes her head, and I smile down at her, softening like I never have before. It feels weird, but not totally alien, and I find myself actually liking it. I kind of like finding someone to be soft for, even if she’s currently icing us out.
“You don’t want to explain why you’ve been intentionally avoiding us?” I push gently, sneaking my hand to the back of her neck and scratching softly at her nape. A move I’ve found melts her entirely, just like it does now.
Her whole body relaxes more than it had been seconds before, and I can’t even describe what that does to my chest, my heart filling almost to bursting. Another sign that I’m absolutelysunk for this woman, her absence fucking with me more than I ever thought it would. I knew I was growing attached, we all did, but I’m no less surprised by how deeply I’m in the water.
Maddie finally looks away and slurs, “No. You’ll think it’s stupid.”
“I promise I won’t,” I counter easily, almost desperate to know why we were hung out to dry, with only two texts from her in a week.
She looks back at me, and a new vulnerability fills those pretty blues, shocking me into silence. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that look on her face in the months I’ve known her, and I’ll be punched square in the face by King Kong himself if it doesn’t completely sucker me. My heart pinches so hard that I feel it ache, pounding so loudly I’m sure she would be able to hear it if she wasn’t drunk.
And then she wrecks me when she whispers sadly, her voice warbling with an underlying note of tears, “I’m too much.”
I keep my fingers moving against her neck, softly scratching as I ask, “What do you mean?”
