Chapter Twelve
Remi
The fire in my wood burning stove cast an orange glow across my television screen.
I’d seen this nature documentary a few times already, but the cinematography was beautiful, and the narrator’s voice was soothing.
My shift at the clinic had been exhausting, and this time would have been better used finishing my charts, but my cat, was curled up on my lap.
Her contented purring lulled me into a deep relaxation, weighing down my eyelids.
I was just dosing off when my phone buzzed with a text.
It was a video from my best friend, Owen, of his husky, Bandit, burrowing into the snow.
White clumps gathered around his head like a mane.
But then in the last few seconds of the video, Owen accidentally caught another one of his dogs, Indie, charging at his six-foot fence and then launching himself up it and over to the other side.
Off screen Owen exclaimed, “You have to be fucking kidding me.”
Chuckling, I typed out a response, half-aware—maybe sightly more than half—of Alicia moving on the other side of our shared wall.
It wasn’t thin enough for me to know exactly what she was doing, but I could determine she was in her kitchen.
Her voice came through too muffled to hear, but I assumed she was talking to Furgie—it was a bit higher and sweeter than her normal tone.
My lips twitched in something like a smile.
Then all at once, everything went loud. Furgie’s bark was like percussions.
Something large fell to the floor. But it was Alicia’s scream that echoed in my mind.
It harmonized with the ringing in my ears.
My heart punched against my ribs. Bliss launched from my lap as I stood.
I rounded my chair running for my front door.
There was more barking, and something else crashed against the wall.
I couldn’t breathe.
That terrified sound coming from Alicia had robbed me of everything but my need to get to her. To put my body between her and whatever threat she was facing. Whoever he was, I’d tear him apart with my bare hands. My vision was actually red.
I burst into the pitch-black night, barely any light spilled from our windows.
Gripping her doorknob, I turned it. It was locked.
It didn’t matter. I threw my shoulder against it with all my weight.
Splinters of wood flew from the frame as I forced the locked latch open. It hit the wall and swung back at me.
Alicia let out one more scream then fell silent at the sight of me breathing heavily in the shattered remains of her entryway. She was crouched under the countertop, while Furgie barked on the other side of the living room wall.
Every muscle in my body was rigid and flexed.
Scanning the apartment, I couldn’t see anyone but her.
Beside her, I lowered to kneel on the carpet.
The urge to touch her, to make sure she was in one piece was a physical thing.
It lodged in my throat. But I didn’t trust myself to be gentle enough with adrenaline coursing through my blood, so I tilted my head from side-to-side to assess if she’d been hurt.
She stared back at me with her eyes wide and accusing, and her mouth hanging open.
My words scraped through my dry throat. “Is there someone here?”
“Remi,” she ground out. Looking past me, she glared. “My door.”
“Where is he?”
She blinked refocusing on me. “Who?”
“You screamed.”
Understanding dawned on her face, but I still felt very much in the dark. “That’s why you broke through my door.”
A muscle twitched in my jaw.
“No one’s here.”
“I’m not following.”
An irritated edge remained in the glint of her eyes, but her shoulders relaxed away from her ears.
For the barest moment, she pressed her palm to my chest where my heart thrummed.
She snatched it back, taking my balance with her—I caught myself with one hand on the carpet. The pressure of contact remained.
“It’s a bird,” she said.
“A bird?” I repeated.
She rubbed the side of her neck. “Well, a good-sized bird.”
“There’s no one here?”
“No.” She shook her head.
Exhaling through pinched lips, I closed my eyes as gratitude and relief washed through me.
She was safe.
“A bird.”
“A good-sized bird,” she insisted.
“I can take care of a bird.” When I opened my eyes, I found Alicia with her eyebrows raised as high as they could go. “What?”
“Kinda seems like you were here to take care of a whole-ass human.”
Without knowing how to respond I just shrugged and ignored the sick feeling in my stomach.
Now that I was growing aware of myself again, I was certain that I would have charged to help anyone.
But my urgency. The lack of conscious decision on my part deserved self-reflection, but before I could look into it much further, I .
. . didn’t. Of course I reacted quickly.
I was scared for my neighbor—my ex-wife, even.
There was nothing to read into.
“I need a towel,” I said.
“For the bird?”
I smirked. “Well, a good-sized towel.”
“Smart ass.” She peaked over my shoulder in the direction of where Furgie barked and scratched at the wall. Alicia chewed on her bottom lip; she leaned back against the counter.
Tilting my head, I considered her. “I don’t think it’s going to dive-bomb you.”
“You don’t think so, but you don’t know.”
God, this woman.
“Where’s a towel? I’ll get it,” I offered.
“There should be one in the dryer—” she continued explaining the location, but I was sure it was in the same closet by the side-door as mine was.
The stackable washer and dryer were just where I’d expected, behind bi-fold doors.
On one of the handles, a bright-green lace bra dangled, and I wondered if she had a matching pair of underwear. She always did like a set.
Unbidden, the image of her wearing only that popped into my mind.
It was an effort to divert my thoughts. Instead, I became singularly attentive in finding a towel.
Pulling a big, new looking, fluffy terry cloth out of the dryer, I strode past where Alicia was huddled under the countertop and into the living room.
I instantly spotted the bird perched on a curtain rod.
Furgie continued jumping underneath it; her claws scraped the wood paneled wall trying to run up it.
The black feathers on the bird’s breast caught the light with each of its quick breaths.
It was pretty worn out, but not so much that it didn’t try to fly away as I caught it in the middle of the towel.
“I got it,” I called over my shoulder. Furgie whined and bounced around my legs, pulling my attention between the bird and not stepping on the dog as I moved toward the demolished front door.
Standing, Alicia gave the bundle in my hands a weary look. “I hope it likes the opulent absorption of my new towel. I’ll probably have to burn it after this.”
“I’m sure that’s exactly what the bird is thinking, ‘Wow, thank God, for the opulence.’ ”
“And absorption.”
It wiggled a bit inside my hands. At the gaping door jam, I almost opened my arms but then thought better of it. “Will you put the leash on Furg? I don’t want her chasing after this thing when I let it go.”
“Right. Yeah, good idea.”
A few moments later, I released the bird into the night with Furgie pulling at Alicia’s arm. It flew to the trees lining the property, disappearing into the dark.
After a few seconds, the dog started whining, and Alicia asked, “Will it be okay?”
“It didn’t look injured. How’d it get in?”
“I think through the woodburning stove, I don’t know, it all happened really fast.”
I made a mental note to check the cap was secure at the top of the chimney in the morning.
But it would have to come second to fixing her door.
Now that I could really assess the damage I’d done—it wasn’t going to be the easiest correction to make.
I’d destroyed more than just the latch. One of the hinges had torn out of the wall, and another one was barely hanging on.
The door frame itself would have to be replaced.
There was no way it was going to be secure enough for her to sleep at her place. If it had been easy for me to break in when it was in perfect working order, it would take a light breeze to bring it down now.
“You really pulled a Kool-Aid Man.” She bent and picked up a splinter the length of her hand.
“I did . . .” There was no way to suggest what I needed to that didn’t make me into an even bigger asshole, so I just asked, “How do you feel about sleeping at my place tonight?”