Chapter 10
10
M ACKENZIE
Oh, fucking no.
The noise upstairs has become unbearable, not because it’s loud, but because it’s obnoxious.
Laugher spills through the walls and loud music wafts from my neighbor’s apartment.
I filled out an entire sheet of paper describing all the cars and people invited to her party.And man, does she like to dance and have people over or what?
My eyes nearly water from straining while trying to grasp everybody’s features and make sure he isn’t one of the guests.
What difference would it make if he was here?
Honestly, I can’t tell.
All I know is that I don’t want him upstairs to mingle with those people, and I don’t want him anywhere near that woman.
I don’t want him anywhere near any woman.
As strange as it sounds to feel that way, it comes so naturally to me.
“Is it worse?” Kayla asks, watching me through my phone camera from the other end of the line while I stare up at the ceiling.
I tip my gaze down.
“It’s annoying,” I say, a wry smile lining my lips.
“People do these things around this time of year,” she says humorously, and we both laugh.
“They sure do, and I never get invited to one of those loud, obnoxious parties,” I comically complain.
Her hands goes up in protest.
“I invited you to my party.”
“Yes, yes. Yes. And I’m so sorry. You know how much I love you and your parents, and their cute home. But you also know how much I hate to travel.”
She dismisses me with a soft gesture and a faint smile.
“Don’t worry. I don’t enjoy traveling either.”
We continue our conversation, and she talks about her cousins and the guy she met back home, while half of my focus stays on the mayhem upstairs.
It’s a good thing he hasn’t shown up. I would’ve hated it to know he was upstairs. My thoughts wander away, spinning that idea for a while, when I pick up my phone and walk to the window, half listening to Kayla.
“Is it snowing over there?” she asks, realizing that I’m looking out the window.
My eyes go from the building’s entrance to the sky.
“No. It’s just cold.”
Ice lines the sidewalks, and the old trees look like they’ve been dipped in marzipan.
“It’s not bad…” I murmur absently while moving my eyes across the street.
Some windows are dark, and some are faintly lit while Christmas lights pulse hypnotically, and the blue lights from the TV screens glow in the rooms.
A couple of men walk down the street, and I only see their backs. They wear short coats like Callan and are built like him.
Their strides are large and confident and they maintain situational awareness while chatting to each other.
Soon after, they stop, pivot slightly and look at my building.
I instinctively pull back as if they’ve stared at me. No way they have.
“What happened?” Kayla asks, munching on a gingerbread sandwich cookie.
It looks delicious, a bit of creamy filling smeared across her lips.
“Nothing.”
I gesture with my finger at her mouth, and she wipes it off, laughing.
“Are those your mother’s cookies?” I ask, my mouth watering at the thought of them.
“Uh-huh. I’ll bring you a dozen when I return.”
“No need to keep them for me until then. Eat them all now. They’ll go stale.”
She lifts her hand in protest while shoving the rest of her cookie into her mouth.
“She’ll bake another batch. Everybody loves her cookies in our house,” she says, chewing on her food. “So, what did you see outside?” she asks, looking down while searching for a napkin.
“Uh…”
I move my eyes back to the sidewalk, my eyebrows tilting up. “What the…?” I murmur, leaning forward and checking the street.
“Are you seeing something interesting over there?” she asks in the background.
One of the men lit a cigarette, and he’s now checking something on his phone. The other shoves his hands into his pockets and looks down the street.
I move my eyes up, following the direction of his gaze.
The headlights of a car glow across the road before moving to the spot where the two men stand.
They seem relaxed and casual, and I can’t find a good reason for them to surveil the street and looking consistently at my building.
I’m only seeing them because I’m peering at them from above. No one else can spot them since they’re next to the poorly lit entrance of another building, not even in the cone of light.
The car decelerates before coming to a stop.
The back door opens, and a man steps out.
Everything happens so quickly.
Him climbing out, the door sliding closed, and the car moving away without wasting another precious moment.
The man straightens and squares his shoulders, and every fiber in my body recognizes him.
He wears a long coat that looks stunning on him, highlighting his rock hard frame, and gloves that hug his hands smoothly.
Who the hell is Callan?
The two other individuals who’ve seemed at odds with my street pull out of the shadow, one stubbing his cigarette out.
They seem connected to Callan and have an interesting dynamic with him.
I bet Kayla’s last gingerbread sandwich cookie that they work for him.
The same way that I do.
“I’d be damned,” I let out, forgetting about Kayla.
“Is something wrong?”
The seriousness in her voice makes me shift my eyes to her.
“Can I call you back in a minute?”
Her eyes search mine.
“Are things okay?”
I push out a clipped smile.
“Everything is good. I spotted someone downstairs, and I want to talk to them,” I say nonchalantly.
“Oh. Sure. Of course. Call me when you can.”
We hang up before I shift my attention to the street, a jolt of tension barreling through me.
Shit.
They’re gone.
I pull my robe closer and walk out on the balcony. The cold greets me with a could of icicles.
I don’t care.
My eyes move up and down and to the entrance.
Where did they go?
I only looked away for a few seconds.
A shiver rams through me.
A few seconds were enough for them to disappear?
Were they headed up the street?
Down the street?
I look up and down.
There’s no sign of them.
Ugh.
There are no moving cars.
I bite my lip in frustration.
Have they entered my building?
I zip around and head back, forgetting my phone on the window sill and my keys on the counter.
Never mind. I don’t have time to grab them.
Wearing slippers, my pajamas, and my bathrobe, I pull at my hair to gather it into a bun on the top of my head while walking casually out of my apartment and leaving my door slightly open so I don’t get locked out, which happened once since I moved here.
Thinking about a good reason why I may be walking to the stairwell if anyone has asked, I listen to the chaotic noise in the building.
There is the clamor upstairs. The music. The giggling. And then there are the steps trailing up the stairs. I’m way more interested in them and where they’re headed.
Making as little noise as I can, I float toward the stairwell, where I stop and look down.
A man’s broad shoulders catch my eye when I glimpse his back. He reaches the landing and pivots toward me before taking the next flight of stairs and inching closer to my floor.
His eyes meet mine, and I melt inside, entirely losing my focus and experiencing a surreal sensation.
It’s like I’m looking at a movie and not a real man closing the distance between us.
His long coat renders him even more mesmerizing, and his eyes harboring a touch of dark green amber glimmer even more enthralling now.
Feverishly, I search for a smile on his face.
Even the hint of a smile.
The slightest trace of a grin.
A voice blares in my head, directing me to go back.
“What are you doing here?” he asks quietly once he pulls in front of me, and I have to tilt my face up to keep my eyes locked with his.
He slipped his words under his breath as if he didn’t want to drawn anyone’s attention to us. Assuming that some of the guests might roam outside Carmen’s apartment.
But there’s no one in the stairwell. No one besides us.
A soft carol drifts down from a different apartment than the one hosting the party.
He’s going to that woman.
He’s a guest as well.
Maybe he is more than that.
“Mackenzie?”
His voice moves like a snake across my skin, and it dawns on me that I have a story to tell. Even if it’s a lie.
I still need to give him an explanation to erase the impression that I’ve been waiting for him.
It also dawns on me that he looks smashing in his black clothes, shiny shoes, and fashionable coat.
And also that his watch gleams like his eyes, a marvel of beauty and precision.
His lips have that magic dust, making it impossible for me to look elsewhere. I, on the other hand, am nothing like that.
I look like I’ve fallen out of the dryer, smelling nice but crumpled.
“I was…”
I have no idea what to say. I was doing what? Going shopping? Or having coffee with a friend?
Attending the party upstairs?
“I have some information for you…” I blabber.
He seems more concerned with something else.
“Have you been watching me? How did you know I’d be here?” he asks.
Yeah… That might work.
Thanking him inside my head for throwing me a lifeline, I gesture at the first floor.
“I was, uh… surveilling the street. And I noticed these two men. They looked suspicious. And then I saw you talking to them and realized you knew them. And then I lost sight of you. Because I was also talking to my friend…”
Oh, my.
Can this get any cringier?
I don’t seem to be able to stop myself from telling him every move I made, what I said to Kayla. What I thought. And how I felt. I keep searching for an exit from this embarrassing verbal report about… nothing.
He listens to me, more interested in the strands of hair cascading from the top of my head and the small patch of skin visible above the popped collar of my plush robe.
He slides one hand into his pocket and brings his gloved fingers to my face.
The leather is imbued with the exotic smell of his cologne, a dash of smoke, and winter notes.
A smile looms across his lips.
“Where is the information?” he mellowly asks, amused by the flutter of my lips, and I swiftly realize I didn’t bring the sheet of paper with me.
“It’s, uh…”
I gesture at the corridor behind me.
“It’s inside. I wanted to get it for you, but I locked myself out,” I lie at the last moment, surprised by my bold move.
Things make much more sense now.
Why I’m here empty-handed.
Waiting for him.
Blah, blah, blah.
Unrelated to our conversation, he flicks his eyes up as a door opens––it’s most likely the door to Carmen’s place––and a loud noise floods the hallway.
Voices travel to us, and surprisingly, he promptly nudges me inside the corridor and moves with me around the corner, seeking the protection of a cone of darkness.
A man and two women climb the stairs, speaking loudly, unsettling the silence.
A few more moments pass before they exit the building.
It’s hard not to notice his entire focus has been on them, his grip harboring tension against my face.
He shifts his eyes to me, and we stay silent for a moment.
I’m studying his face.
He looks at me with wonder in his eyes.
“Are you in some kind of danger?” I murmur unable to tear my eyes away from him.
A smile fleets through his gaze.
“Danger? What makes you say that?”
I shrug.
“There are too many people around you. And what’s going on upstairs seems so important to you. And there must be something else. Because you’re not truly interested in that woman.”
He tilts his chin down, narrowing his eyes at me, a muscle throbbing in his face.
His smile is still there, dipped in amusement.
“You probably don’t even need me…” I press further, and his lips relax and part slightly, showing off his strong teeth.
I can only imagine all the women who have dropped their panties and opened their legs only to see him smile like that.
His power to shut down your brain and remove any trace of logical thinking before turning you into putty in his hands and compelling you to follow your primal instincts only to enjoy the feel of him inside your body is unquestionable.
I get a taste of the effects of that insidious force in his eyes as my knees soften, my skin warms and throbbing tension builds inside my body.
“I do need you…” he says quietly, staring at my lips as if pondering something, his gloved fingers brushing over my skin. “I need you more than you think,” he adds, and I lose my breath.
He’s either fucking it me, setting me up, testing me, or simply entertaining himself while gauging my reaction.
I was talking about him needing me to collect information about the people living upstairs.
And he sounded like he was talking about me. About needing me. Mackenzie Prince. The unemployed woman extraordinaire with a knack for spying on strange people and selling my services to men like him who scare the shit out of me and arouse me at the same time.
He said that as if the man in him needed the woman in me.
That’s how it came across, but why would he need me?
I must look like a lost puppy with my fingers splayed over his fine wool sleeve, my mouth open, and my eyebrows pushed up in eternal wonder.
What am I supposed to say to that?
“Why…?” I ask, sincerely baffled.
He gives me a smooth laugh, another tool in his seductive toolbox, and flicks his head toward the door of my apartment.
“You never know when I need to climb that balcony again,” he says and winks at me, a soft, languorous gaze wrapping around me like a bow.
My cheeks burn at the idea that he is flirting with me.
His hand slides down, and I fear he’s taking it away just as the door opens upstairs again, and a blizzard of voices rolls into the stairwell. More people leave. Or maybe they’re constantly opening the door to meet and greet the new guests climbing the stairs.
He seems distracted only for a moment before shifting his focus to me, ready to leave. I can see that in his eyes and the way he pulls his shoulders back.
“Make sure you trim your pussy in case I fall on you again,” he tosses at me casually, a smile glinting in his eyes before he leans to me, taking me completely by surprise, and presses his lips to the corner of my mouth.
The contact is brief, yet it comes with the heat of an atomic blast, shaking me to my core, making me tremble, and destroying the rhythm of my heart. Never in my life have I felt something so powerful coming from something so innocent.
Innocent, it wasn’t. I still can’t believe he kissed me. My fingers go to the spot graced by his lips while he smoothly retreats, tall and dressed to the nines with his hands still gloved.
I stare at his back, my lips hurting from the memory of him so close to me.
His lips have touched mine.
I can’t believe it.
He stops in the doorway and spins back to me unexpectedly.
“Do you need any help with your door?” he asks while I struggle to regain my focus.
“My door?”
“Yes. You just said you’d locked yourself out.”
“Um… No. I’ll go to the super. He has a set of keys. Don’t worry about me.”
I can’t believe I’m able to carry a normal conversation while my heart and stomach are free falling, and my legs feel like blobs of rubber.
His eyes stay on me for another second before he rips his stare away and, without saying anything else, walks to the upper level.
I hate this with a vengeance.
Why does he have to go upstairs?
Harboring mixed feelings, I tighten my grip on the collar of my bathrobe and stroll back to my apartment.
Cold air moves around my ankles as I reach the end of the hallway and stop in front of my door.
Sunk in thought, I curl my fingers around the doorknob and push through when I suddenly come to a halt, hitting the hard, polished wooden surface.
“What the fuck?” I mutter, rattling the doorknob.
I look up and check the number to see if there has been the slightest possibility of having tried a different door.
And then the reality of it hits me.
I fucking locked myself out.
What are the chances?
See what I’m getting for being a liar. And my phone is inside.
“Oh, fuck you, Karma,” I mumble, spinning around and heading to the superintendent’s apartment. “Now watch him not being home.”
Sighing, I trail to the stairs before taking them down.
Moments later, I knock on his door.