Chapter Three
Dickens
“What kind of a name is Spike?”
Not that I’d spent most of the day obsessing over the hot new neighbor.
Sunshine gave me a long, level look.
“Well?”
Slowly, she smiled.
Seriously? “What are you smiling about?”
She quirked an eyebrow. “I think you like him.”
“Preposterous.”
“And I think he likes you.”
“Sun, you haven’t even met the guy.”
“Who says?”
My brain screeched to a halt like a needle scratching a record. “What?”
“You think I didn’t go next door to introduce myself and welcome him to town?”
She smiled that serene smile that always drove me nuts. Like she knew something I didn’t and wasn’t likely to share. “And?”
A demand she wasn’t likely to obey.
“His name isn’t really Spike.”
She held up her hand to ward off my questions. “But he didn’t share his birth name, and I didn’t push. He’s been a mechanic for fifteen years, used to work in a shop in Surrey, and recently crossed the Fraser River to take up residence in our fair city.”
She tapped a finger to her lips. “And you guys are more alike than you think.”
Was she…?
Her eyes sparkled. “And no, he didn’t tell me that either. Tries to keep it hidden, so respect that. Not all guys are out and proud like yourself.”
She didn’t need to mention I hadn’t always been. My parents paid for me to attend the University of British Columbia in Vancouver to study business administration.
Sure, I could’ve commuted every day, but they wanted me to have the full college experience, so I’d lived in a dorm for those four years. And experimented. Plenty. By the time I turned twenty-two and was ready to graduate, I felt comfortable coming out to my parents.
And since Sunshine was like a member of the family, she was looped in.
My parents were, of course, incredibly supportive. Possibly a little miffed it took me so long to come out, because they’d suspected since I was in my early teens.
Sun had been sure, of course, but hadn’t breathed a word.
“Slim pickings these days.”
Sure, gay guys lived in Mission City. I even knew a few, including a realtor and a counselor up at Sunshine’s sister Kennedy’s counseling center. Cadence and Justin were nice guys. They were also…not my type.
Both were around my age, both were very handsome, and both were very much tops.
And since I was as well, the compatibility hadn’t been there. Had I been tempted? Sure. But why start a relationship knowing certain things would never work?
“Well, your perfect companion is right next door.”
“Sun.”
I injected as much menace and warning as I could into my voice and her response was, of course, to laugh.
“I’m finished for the day.”
She leaned down to scoop Ari into her arms.
The cat purred and head-butted her neck.
“Want to come home with me? I’ll miss you.”
Sun had kept Ari for the past week, but I’d missed my little one. Well, at nearly twenty pounds, she wasn’t that little. Once, I could hold her in the palm of my hand. Not so much these days.
My errant employee dropped said deadweight onto the counter, and Ari immediately bolted for the keyboard.
I held it up and away, but it was a near thing.
Sunshine laughed all the way out of the store.
Crazy woman. How she could be so happy, given her nine-month marriage ended last month, was beyond me. Or maybe that’s why she was happy. I liked Colton Pritchard just fine, but he wasn’t the right man for Sun. The serious RCMP officer had recently been promoted to a corporal in sex crimes.
Sun was a woman who radiated warmth and goodness.
I think she believed she could lighten up the man.
Well, it hadn’t worked. Now she was alone again. Barely twenty-seven, and two disastrous marriages she needed to put in the rearview mirror.
She had shadows, of course.
Logan, her first husband, had been a stand-up guy. Lots of fun. Then he joined the army, and after a harrowing overseas deployment, had come home a different man.
She tried to buoy him, but he’d wound up taking a swing at her.
He’d left, and despite my general empathy for those serving our country, I’d been happy to see his ass departing.
Then she married Colton before the ink was barely dry on her divorce. Another dark man. She had a type, and it didn’t suit her.
Was Spike my type? Sun knew my preferences, of course. We’d had a way-too-frank discussion not long after I came out. She’d been curious, and I’d just broken up with a guy because of our sexual incompatibility. I would’ve loved to blame it on booze or pot or some other mind-altering substance. The truth? My heart had broken. I really loved Isaac. My first, and if I’d had my way, my only.
Alas, after our experimentation phase ended, we discovered a lack of compatibility. That and he had to go back to Whitehorse when he graduated, and no way was I moving to the Yukon. So I came home to Mission City with the focus of taking over my parents’ shop and the vain hope of putting Sunshine in her place.
I’d succeeded in one of those things.
Ari sat on the counter and blinked lazy eyes up at me.
“No, you’re not getting treats.”
Another blink.
“All right. But just one. Dr. Zephyra said you’re a little heavy, and it’s hard on your joints.”
My cat could probably care less about what her beloved vet’s pronouncements were. With more care than she deserved, I picked her up and set her down on the floor. I meandered through the store to ensure everything was straight. Of course Sunshine had likely just done the same thing, so everything was perfect.
I flipped the sign on the door, flicked the lock, and lowered the blinds. Mission City wasn’t a high-crime area, but having the cash register visible from the street wasn’t a great idea. I put the cash away in the floor safe in the back room, then encouraged Ari to head up the stairs. I set the alarm for the store, then closed that door and headed upstairs.
My cat made a beeline for her food bowl and glared up at me.
“I know Sun fed you this morning, so don’t try to tell me you’re hard done by. I won’t believe you.”
Still, I located some of her favorite expensive kibble and scooped out the appropriate portion. I opened my fridge and surveyed the contents. I’d been a responsible adult and had stopped at the grocery store on my way back into town last night, even though I’d been tired.
Was I up to cooking or—
All logical thought fled as the most horrendous racket thundered through my apartment. Only the steady bass assured me that I wasn’t enduring an earthquake. Nothing shook, but Ari looked up from her bowl and gave me a what the fuck look. This was bad. Anything that separated my cat from her food was a pretty dire thing.
Locating the source of the noise wasn’t a challenge. My kitchen shared a wall with Spike’s new place.
The McKinneys had used the loft as a storage space.
Apparently Spike was either using it as an office or—God forbid—an apartment. Oh shit. Bad enough I had to deal with his noise shit during the day. But at night? I was accustomed to quiet.
Aside from the occasional train whistle, downtown Mission City was tranquil. Even Tim Horton’s and the Greek restaurant—Stavros’s—closed up before eleven. Occasionally a truck rumbled through, but those were few and far between.
My peace was shattered, and I was pissed.
Ari still gazed up at me.
Appease her.
I snagged a tin of wet food and apportioned a slice on a plate for her.
She eyed it greedily as I placed the plate on the floor, but she waited for me to give her permission before she dug in.
Satisfied she’d be okay, I tromped down the stairs. I exited through the back door and stomped over to the next building. The back of our stores faced a back alley, and I had two parking spaces. I kept my Prius in one, and Sunshine used the other when she drove to work.
Spike’s parking space was filled with a beat-up pickup truck that’d seen better days. The windows facing the alley were all shut.
I, on the other hand, had all mine open. I had a/c but used it infrequently, preferring the breeze off the river. On the days when the wind didn’t blow, and the temperatures climbed to over one hundred, I broke down and cranked her up. Naturally we used a/c in the store. Wouldn’t do to have our guests sweating to death.
The closed windows and the still-thumping bass assured me I’d never be heard. I circled around to the front of the store. The noise wasn’t so insane out here, but I could still hear it.
Most of the stores didn’t have apartments over top, and many of the shops were shuttered for the night.
Still, this was rude.
I pounded on the door.
Unsurprisingly, nothing happened. I glanced around.
The main street was, surprisingly, empty.
“Hey, asshole.”
“I hope you’re not referring to me.”
I spun and my stomach sank.
Corporal Colton Pritchard from the RCMP stood across the road from me in the shadow of the storefront for the cell phone repair shop.
Damn.
Sunshine’s asshole ex-husband.
Well, not exactly an asshole. Not a bad guy. Just not suited to my favorite employee and good friend.
The polite thing to do would be to cross the street so I wasn’t yelling. I checked traffic and hustled across First Avenue. “Uh, everything’s fine.”
I cleared my throat. “Lovely night. Are you, uh, alone?”
He pointed down the street. “Dorrie and I just got off shift and decided to grab Tim Horton’s. I thought I’d wander down this way. I miss patrol duty.”
Well, that didn’t sit right with me. He’d hated patrol duty, and that was why he’d pushed for the job in special victims—a promotion and a way off the streets.
Was it possible he was staking out the bookstore? Checking to see if Sunshine was still around? “She’s gone home.”
“I wasn’t…”
The unflappable cop’s expression darkened.
Oh yeah, he was.
He was also out of uniform and looking like an ordinary civilian. Albeit one who topped six feet by a couple of inches. He towered over me. And while I was lean and wiry, he was buff and cut.
Movement caught my eye, and I spotted Dorrie Duhamel making her way down the street carrying a Tim Horton’s paper bag and a tray with two paper cups. At least that part of the story wasn’t a lie. Why here? At this moment? Three guesses and the first two didn’t count.
“Hey, Dorrie.”
We’d gone to school together, but while she’d studied criminology at the Justice Institute, I’d headed into business. She didn’t look any more comfortable than I felt.
“Everything okay, Dickens?
Her question refocused me. “I was knocking on my neighbor’s door to ask him to turn down the music.”
She cocked her head.
“Well, it’s much louder inside. It’s reverberating through my entire apartment and it’s disrupting Ari while she’s eating.”
Dorrie handed the tray to Colton. She snagged a cup for herself and took a sip. “How is Aristotle these days? I haven’t dropped in recently.”
I eyed Colton. Yeah, it’d be awkward to have his partner visit while the guy’s ex-wife was working. Dorrie and Sunshine had been close. How had this split affected their friendship? “I’ll let you guys get on with…”
I waved my hand in the general direction of their food.
“You want me to talk to him?”
Dorrie’s blue eyes softened on me. “For Ari’s sake?”
Oh God, I was so pathetic. “No, that’s okay. I can, you know, use earplugs or something.”
Colton’s dark gaze pierced me. “That’s no way to live. Let us talk to him.”
And have him know I sicced the cops on him his first week in town? No way.
I ran my hand through my hair. “I’m good. Really good. I’ll just leave you to your, uh, dinner.”
I pivoted, waited for two cars to pass, then trotted across the street.
Jaywalking.
Jesus.
I strode around to the back of our properties. I could throw rocks at the window, but if one broke, I’d be in deep shit. Finally, defeated, I re-entered the building and headed back upstairs.
Ari awaited me with a what the fuck expression still in her deep-amber eyes.
I inched over to the front windows and crooked a finger to pull back the drapes to see out. I kept them closed on hot days because of the afternoon sun, but I threw them open at night to let in the cool night air.
Dorrie and Colton sat on a bench across the street, eating their sandwiches.
Did she not think it odd they sat in front of the store where his ex-wife worked? I was pretty sure nothing was going on between the two of them, but I’d been wrong before. Not about Sunshine and Colton, though. That marriage had been doomed from the start.
Should I call Sunshine to tell her—
Jesus Fucking Christ. Was he playing…Whitesnake? Here I Go Again. An eighties hair band? Seriously? I wanted to pound on the wall, but even I wasn’t that stupid. Solid brick. Should’ve been enough to keep out the noise.
I stalked to the bedroom to nab my iPod. I selected an audiobook and turned it on full volume.
And winced. I didn’t want to sacrifice my hearing just to block out the noise. Still, it lowered the rock music to a dull roar, and as I prepared my dinner, I tried not to cringe. No way was I going to be able to live like this for the next fifty years.
Hell, I’d be lucky to make it to the end of the week.