Chapter 7
ROSALIE
Rolling out of the bed completely, I stumbled toward the coffee machine, barely managing to stay upright.
Knock.
Knock.
KNOCK.
Ugh!
Those three sharp raps on the door shattered the fragile peace of my half-conscious state.
Right. I hadn’t exactly sprung out of bed at the crack of dawn with a chipper morning song on my lips. Whoever was on the other side of the door could just cool their heels. I needed my coffee if I was going to deal with anyone.
Fumbling, with bleary eyes, I jabbed random buttons on the coffee machine.
Please, please turn on.
Eventually, I heard the machine hum. Thank God. I’d never been a morning person. Never a patient one either.
“Hurry up,” I muttered.
The machine didn’t. It continued to take a millennium, and the knocking persisted, though it was a tad louder this time, maybe even impatient.
Squinting through the peephole, I strained to make out the figure on the other side.
A man stood there shifting his legs slightly.
I caught a glimpse of a smile, barely-there beneath the .
. . growth on his face. It was a beard, but it certainly wasn’t trimmed.
His boots, scuffed and worn but well-maintained, completed the picture. But who was he?
A slice of light shined in my eyes, making it difficult to see, but I persisted.
My gaze darted down, searching for a clue.
There, pinned to the right side of his shirt, was a small plastic badge.
The name tag read “Johnny,” and the company logo was beside it.
He worked for a camera company, it seemed. I squinted again to get a better look.
Oh . . . a security company.
My eyes rolled as soon as I understood. There was only one man worried about my safety enough to pull something like this.
Max.
Grabbing my phone, I found his contact and quickly dialed his number. One ring, two, and then his gruff voice filled the air.
“Who is this?” he grumbled on the other end of the line.
I’d had just about enough of this man. “What do you mean, ‘Who is this?’ You know who this is!”
“Rosalie.” Max’s voice softened immediately. “Is there a man on the other side of your door?”
“Yeah.”
“Right, that’s Johnny. Let him in.”
I didn’t care who it was. “No.”
“Don’t make this complicated.”
“I will make this complicated. I’m not inviting a random man into my house.”
“What about me? Would you let me in?”
He was here too?
Taking a deep breath, I cautiously peeked through the peephole again. There, approaching from the main door, stopping right next to Johnny, was Max. I’d forgotten how tall he was, but that didn’t mean I’d forgotten how grumpy.
They were having a separate conversation on the other side of the door—one I couldn’t hear through the phone.
Defeated, with a sigh that spoke volumes of my irritation (and my particular weakness for arrogant men), I reached for the doorknob and slowly cracked the door open.
The moment Max’s eyes found mine, he smiled—the kind that usually melted my control but this time only intensified my anger. I realized now it was way too early to deal with him.
“Absolutely not,” I declared, my voice surprisingly strong.
I moved to shut the door, imagining the satisfying click. But just as my fingertips brushed the cold wood of the doorframe, just before the oh-so-satisfying click could sound, a well-shined Oxford shoe wedged itself between the door and the jamb.
Of course.
Then I saw it. In his hand he held a large, steaming cup of coffee, with my name written on it in a cursive.
Oh? He’d come prepared.
I’d tried to forget it, but that feeling in my belly returned.
He pushed past the door, his body heat momentarily invading my personal space, and held the coffee out to me.
I grabbed it.
“Go ahead,” Max said to Johnny.
He stepped inside.
I craned my neck to see the sheepish-looking man shuffling through my apartment with his bag of equipment. Johnny went straight to work, muttering something about cables, while Max took a slow, deliberate stride toward me.
I held the warm cup, inhaling the rich hazelnut cream, surprised he’d got my order right. I blew against the surface before taking a sip and then licked my lips, feeling the warmth of the coffee on my tongue.
The light from above Max shined directly onto his face, making his eyes appear brighter—the same eyes that trailed the length of my body. He didn’t look too happy.
I realized now that I wasn’t wearing my usual makeup and dress. This time, it was my rumpled shorts—which rode halfway up my ass—and a tank top that made boob-slips easy.
Poor guy.
His jaw hardened. “You . . .” he began with a nervous huff. “You’re not dressed.” He looked for as long as he could before pulling his gaze away from me.
“Well, no. It’s six in the morning,” I stated, matter-of-fact. “I just woke up.”
He looked at his watch. “It’s eight-thirty.”
“That’s still too early.”
He lifted his hand and ran it down his face in disbelief. Then he looked at Johnny, who was looking at me. If anyone knew Max, they’d know not to look at me at all.
“Would you like to keep your sight, Johnny?”
Johnny looked away.
Figures.
Max scratched his head, returning his gaze to me. He couldn’t seem to go ten seconds without looking at me. That, of course, made me smile—a tiny, smug little thing.
“Rosalie,” he urged, “if you could get dressed so I can look at you while I speak, that would be great.”
Max took the opportunity to scan the room, his gaze lingering on the new shower curtain I’d desperately needed and the blinds I’d wrestled with for an afternoon, cursing left and right as I struggled to put them on the wall.
Anyway, I’d done it. Sure, Max was overreacting, and he was often overbearing, but I couldn’t help but listen to his worries.
“I will once I’ve had my coffee,” I muttered, taking a sip. “Couldn’t help yourself, could you?” I asked, referring to the security.
“No.” His eyes drifted, and I watched his jaw clench before he cleared his throat. “Not if you keep your door unlocked.”
“How long will this take?” I asked, blowing against the surface of my coffee. I liked the smell and the taste, but it did little to calm my patience.
“However long it takes,” he said.
My eyes rolled. I hated his vague answers.
“Are you in a rush?” He narrowed his eyes.
“I have a lunch at noon, so hopefully, you’ll be done by then.”
“A lunch?” he asked. “Who’ll be joining you?”
He was nosy. Insufferably nosy. Jealous too, if I had to guess. It was a tiny crack in that oh-so-serious, stoic facade of his.
Truth was, I was going to lunch with a woman named Alex. She often forgot about our lunches, which always made it a gamble, but this was for her birthday. She was a Leo. She was also seventy-two years old. For obvious reasons, we weren’t romantic, but Max didn’t need to know that.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” I said, smiling coyly. I liked to tease him.
“Yeah, I would,” he admitted.
My cheeks heated beneath his gaze. I didn’t expect such a direct answer. The man wanted to know everything about me, but he never shared anything about himself.
“Alex,” I said.
“Alex,” he mocked. “Who is Alex?”
“The person I’m meeting for lunch,” I said mischievously.
He frowned. “I don’t have the energy to deal with you today.”
“Do you think you’re that much easier to endure?” I muttered.
Max stayed silent until Johnny was finished setting everything up. Then Johnny gave me the rundown on how the system worked and what the codes were, while Max gave him a dark look the entire time.
The codes were a bunch of numbers and letters that blurred together in my mind. Codes I wouldn’t remember even if my life depended on it—a fact I found strangely ironic.
Johnny finished his explanation, leaving the apartment with a whoosh as the door closed behind him. Max, however, seemed to have grown roots by the doorway. He stayed looming over me like a particularly annoying gargoyle.
“Shouldn’t you be . . .” I started, unsure of how to phrase my question, “getting back to whatever you mobsters do?”
“Trying to get rid of me, are we?”
“Subtlety isn’t my strong suit.”
“Noted,” he drawled, taking a step closer, effectively trapping me between him and the door. “Though, for your information, most mobsters wouldn’t be caught dead babysitting a tech installation.”
What did that say about him?
“Protective, are we?” I teased.
“That might be putting it mildly.”
With that, Max slipped out the door, leaving just as I’d asked him to.