Chapter 18
June
Bang, bang.
Clutching a cleaning rag, I stare at my apartment door, terrified to open it.
Yesterday, a man was yelling in the hallway. He sounded drunk. He was raging, slamming doors, banging walls, and screaming for over an hour. Eventually, a woman yelled from farther down the hallway that she was calling the cops if he didn’t plug a hole in it.
What if that’s him?
After hesitating for a second, I tiptoe to the door. A muscle in my neck twinges from having spent last night sleeping in the tub when something bit me in my bed. I rub it distractedly on my way.
Bang, bang.
I jump.
"You gonna open the door, lady?" a man barks out.
I peek through the peephole.
It’s a man in a light brown delivery uniform. He’s holding a parcel in his hands that he lifts as if he feels me watching him. I didn’t order anything. So what is that?
Frowning, I open the door. "Sorry. It's my first time living alone. How did you know I was there?"
He hands me the package and pulls a clipboard from where he’s tucked it under one arm. "Creaky floorboards. Sign here."
“Thanks.” I take the pen he offers me and sign where he points, hand the pen back, and scurry back inside my apartment with the package as he retreats with the clipboard.
"You'll figure it out. And, lady?"
"Yeah?"
"You want to be careful about who you tell that to."
My cheeks burn at how stupid it was to tell a stranger I live alone.
"I have a daughter around your age," he says, face softening. "Be careful, okay?"
"Okay."
The man leaves, and I close the door and study the medium, relatively light package. It’s my apartment address, but it’s not my name.
I hadn’t thought anyone lived in this apartment for weeks, if not months, given how filthy it was when I first arrived. After I'd searched for more roaches, I spent most of yesterday cleaning every surface with bleach. Twice.
I chew my lip as I consider what to do. Then I remember the realtor who showed me around saying I could go to the super on the first floor if I had any problems. Maybe he’ll know what to do with the package.
I shouldn’t have accepted it all, but I was so scared about who was knocking, I didn’t think.
Stuffing my feet into my sandals, I grab my keys and head down the stairs to see the super, double-checking that I locked the door first.
I haven’t spoken to any of my neighbors yet, and with the way that guy was shouting yesterday, I’m not sure I want to.
I pass a series of closed doors, my nose twitching at the scents of spicy curry and herby smoke on my way to reach the first floor.
There’s an elevator, but the realtor said it didn’t work.
The super’s door is easy to find. A sign on the door says Super, on the first floor of the old apartment building that, in the bright early morning, seems older and more rundown than when I viewed it.
A TV is on way louder than it needs to be, and even though it’s the morning, it smells of Chinese food.
I knock on my super’s door.
“What?” a man calls out, his annoyance loud and clear.
I clear my throat and reach for the politeness I learned at Haven Academy. “I have a package. It came to my apartment, but it’s not mine. I thought maybe it belonged to the old…” My voice trails off when someone wrenches the door open.
The super, a grizzled-looking dark-haired man in his fifties, dressed in dark blue overalls, flicks tired gray eyes from me to the package, snatches it out of my hands and slams the door in my face.
I stumble backward, my hair blowing into my face from the force of his slam. I stare, stunned into silence by his rudeness.
What the hell?
Pressing my ear to the door, I hear the unmistakable sounds of someone tearing the brown paper-wrapped package open.
It had a woman’s name on it. Felicia Monroe. The super had a patch sewn on the front pocket of his overalls that said Bill. I frown, my eyebrows drawing together. He shouldn’t be opening mail that doesn’t belong to him.
With my back stiffening, I knock firmly on the door.
Two seconds later, the super wrenches it open.
Over his right shoulder, I spot the parcel on his coffee table. It’s open. I can’t see what it contained because he steps to the right, blocking my view.
“What?” he demands.
My outrage withers under his dark glare. “I just… I just—”
Bang.
Making a face, I turn around, hoping never to need anything from that man because I’m unlikely to get it.
When I return to my apartment, I look at the dark blue fabric couch and then at my bed, automatically scratching my arm. I’m hungry, and I need a shower, but I have to do something about this apartment first.
After slipping on my new denim jacket, I take the bus to the nearest grocery store and head for the cleaning department. I pick up a can of bug spray and, once I’ve thought about my plan of attack for a little longer, a lint roller.
Paying for both is painful. Everything is so expensive.
I didn’t appreciate how lucky I was to have everything handed to me.
Now I check the prices of everything, carefully count out my change, and try to work out how much longer my money will last. Once I’ve dealt with the things crawling on me in my apartment, I can find a job.
Back in my apartment, I stuff my bedsheets into a trash bag and drag the mattress onto the floor.
Plugging my nose with a finger and thumb, I spray the ever-loving crap out of the mattress and the couch with the bug spray, then leave the apartment with my bedding in trash bags to find the nearest laundromat.
Will my plan to kill whatever bit me last night work? I have no clue, but I can’t afford to find another apartment or get this place fumigated. This will have to do.
A man is dozing at the laundromat counter, about a fifteen-minute walk from my apartment. It smells of warm, clean linen, and a machine is shaking as it furiously spins.
I clear my throat.
He jerks upright. His brown eyes widen as his chair tips. Before he can crack his head open or I can dart forward to grab him, he grips the counter, steadying himself.
Safe from a cracked head, he eyes me with the hostility I deserve for nearly killing him. “Yeah?”
Feeling itchy just holding the trash bag with my bedding, I lift it so he can see it over the counter. “I need to wash this, but I’m not sure how to use the machines.”
Yes, I could probably read the instructions on the machines or struggle to figure it out, but I don’t have money to waste on getting it wrong, and I’ve learned from my short time of looking after myself how little I know. I need all the help I can get.
He stares at me, and I know what he must be thinking: spoiled rich girl forced to fend for herself or an idiot with no life skills.
He’s right on both counts.
Braced for his anger, I blink, surprised when he heaves himself up from his stool and, sighing heavily, snags a container of detergent from a shelf behind him. “This way.”
I trail him to one of the big metal machines, bypassing the ones already spinning and whirling.
“Your clothes go in the washing machine.” He points, and I stuff the bedding into the machine, then I turn to him.
He closes the door with more force than I would have used. “For a big load, you need eight quarters. You got quarters?”
I shake my head.
Another sigh makes me feel like the biggest idiot in the world, but his tone isn’t cruel when he says, “Wait here.”
He’s back in seconds with a handful of quarters, and I watch him feed them into the slot in the machine. He pours liquid into the machine and checks that I’m watching. “You got all that?”
I nod. “Then you just choose linen or whatever it is you’re washing?”
There’s no loud sigh this time. Am I less of an idiot in his eyes now? I hope so.
He twists the dial, then points at the time on the machine.
“Thirty minutes. Some people pay me to switch stuff from the washing machine to the dryer. They come at the end of the day to collect. That costs extra. Some come back to switch clothes from the washing machine to the dryer and then go home or run errands in between. Most do that if they’re locals. ”
I nod, understanding.
He leads me to the row of dryers in a much hotter part of the laundromat.
Clothes bounce and whirl through the glass doors.
“These take about the same time, less if you’re doing clothes instead of bedding.
And you want the highest heat for bedding, or you’ll be feeding quarters, and it still won’t dry all the way.
Use a cart to move your clothes from one machine to the next. ”
“How many quarters for the dryer?”
“Eight.”
“Where can I get quarters? Do I have to go to the bank, or do you have some?”
“Some get them from me; if you have cash, I can change it, but most keep a jar at home and bring what they need.”
There are so many things I need to learn. I should buy a notebook and a pen because every day I discover another new thing I should have been doing all along.
I offer him five dollars that I pull from my jeans pocket. “Can I buy some quarters from you? And the detergent. Can I get it here?”
He takes the folded bill, and I follow him back to the counter as he answers. “I sell detergent, but it’s cheaper to get it from the store. Get the pods or get yourself a small container so you’re not loading yourself down like a mule. Once your back goes, it’s gone. Ask me how I know.”
From his hunched back, I don’t need to ask.
When he gives me quarters, they add up to five dollars. He gave me detergent for free and did the first load for me.
“You gave me too much money back.” I start to hand him quarters.
He waves off my offer. “Better someone ask me how somethin’ works and I show them than they break my machines fooling around with things they don’t understand.”
“Thank you. You’ve been really helpful.” And kind. Much kinder than I thought he would be after I nearly killed him.
He makes a sound in his throat as he settles back on his stool behind the counter. Crossing his arms, he closes his eyes and returns to the nap I disturbed him from.
I check on my washing machine, and it’s doing what it’s supposed to do. Water is filling the machine, and it’s rumbling as loudly as the one beside it. Then I head back to my apartment, hoping the bug spray has killed whatever bit me last night.
I can barely breathe without the fumes chasing me out. I open all the windows and use the lint roller over every bit of fabric on the mattress—front and back. Then I move onto the couch.
My back aches from hunching over for so long. Even after I’ve used the lint roller over the mattress and the couch, I keep thinking I see something moving out of the corner of my eye.
Suddenly remembering my laundry, I hurry out of my apartment, sprint down the road, turn a corner, and bounce off something so hard the impact knocks me on my ass.
“Are you okay?” a concerned male voice calls out.
Everything about the man who helps me up from the ground is perfect. From the top of his sandy dark-blond hair, his handsome sun-kissed face, gray eyes, perfectly tailored shirt and pants, to the tips of his Italian brown leather loafers.
An alpha.
He comes from money, maybe even more of it than my parents. His scent hits me next: caramel and peppermint. Not an unpleasant combination, but an unusual one.
“Fine.” I retreat a step the second he helps me up.
Omegas are the rarest designation, so they have nests and packs in the nicer parts of town.
I should know; once I was one of those pampered omegas.
Alphas are too dominant and ambitious to stay poor for long.
Running into one in the not-so-nice part of town is a shock to the senses.
I briefly wonder what he’s doing here, but decide I don’t care.
I have no interest in alphas. Not even pretty ones like this one.
“I didn’t hurt you, did I?” His concerned gaze sweeps over me, lingering for a second too long on the bites on my neck.
“No.” I dip my chin to hide the bites from him.
He flashes a mouthful of straight white teeth at me. “Sorry about knocking you down. I was in a hurry and not paying nearly enough attention to where I was going.”
“Me too,” I admit, my eyes darting past him and to the laundromat where I have a washing machine full of wet clothes I need to move into the dryer. “I have laundry.”
He steps aside, his smile warm and friendly. “Sorry to keep you. Maybe I’ll see you around again without the knocking you down part?”
“Maybe.” I move past him.
“Oscar,” he introduces himself, as if an afterthought. “I figure I should probably introduce myself since we had an accident.”
Scrunching my nose, I tilt my head, confused.
“We would exchange information if our cars crashed. You know, for insurance purposes.”
My lips twitch, liking him despite myself. I open my mouth to tell him my name, but I’m not Juniper Harrington anymore. My parents couldn’t have made it any clearer if they’d tried that they want nothing to do with me. “June. I’d better go.”
“You take care now, June.”
He walks away, and I peer over my shoulder, confused he’s leaving when I’m almost positive he was flirting with me. I’m not sure what I’d expected, but I guess Pack Wells shaped my views and expectations of alphas in more ways than I realized.
I watch him climb into his green Mercedes and pull away from the sidewalk. Then I hurry into the laundromat to switch my laundry, shaking all thoughts of him out of my mind.