4
Zander
Appropriate Morality
CLUTCHING MY BEER BOTTLE, I TRIED TO look away but couldn’t.
Down below, in Melody’s overgrown wild back garden, Sailor sat alone at the wrought-iron café table for two. The metal used to be painted black, but the years had weathered it, and now rust crawled up the arms and legs.
Leaning against the window frame where I stood in my bedroom, I wished I was closer so I could see how she was coping.
From up here, she looked okay.
Her straight back and fierce hold on the book she was reading seemed normal enough but, at the same time, all wrong. She was too still, too tense.
Was she struggling being back so soon?
Had Jim put her furniture in its rightful place so she didn’t see evidence of just how badly Milton had thrown her around the house?
Taking a swig of beer, I took my glasses off and rubbed at the indent left behind on my nose.
Guilt squeezed my insides.
After all my determination to leave things alone, I’d…done something.
Something that could get me into a lot of trouble.
Last night, after I’d come home from the hospital, I’d tried to do exactly what Colin told me to do. I ran on my treadmill to exhaust my body even though my mind kept racing. I had the hottest shower followed by the coldest, shocking my nervous system to reset. I even watched a show I didn’t care about, hoping it would act like a sedative.
Yet at five a.m., I found myself sneaking out my back door, and trespassing onto someone else’s property.
I broke the law.
Me! The guy who’d followed every rule and regulation and was proud of a lifetime of conscientious, appropriate morality had used her spare key and sneaked his way through every room. Melody’s ghost followed me as I used my phone torch to check the house and ensure it was as neat and safe as possible.
But then I saw the blood.
Not much.
A few streaks on the kitchen bench.
A couple of droplets on the dining room floor.
I hadn’t been prepared for the rush of fury; the crippling wash of savagery.
For the first time in my life, I understood what drove other men to murder. Good men. Men who gladly went to prison for executing their wives’ offenders. Men who wouldn’t touch a fly yet suddenly became experts in torture.
And so, I’d done the only logical thing.
I’d raided the cleaning products under the sink and scrubbed every surface and floor until I was sure Sailor’s blood no longer tainted any of it.
I’d replaced the key as the sun shone on my illegal activities, then fallen into bed and crashed into nonsense dreams full of black clouds, blood, and powerlessness.
Colin had woken me at four in the afternoon by pressing an icy-cold, dew-dripping beer bottle against the back of my neck where I lay sprawled on my stomach, still in my black track pants and hoodie.
He’d laughed his ass off as I jolted upright, ordered me to get out of bed, then gone to start the barbecue while I took another shower, trying to rinse away the fog of bad sleep and the knowledge that I’d overstepped.
If Sailor knew I’d been in her house.
If she knew another man had trespassed when she already didn’t feel safe.
Fuck.
“Thought I’d find you up here.” Colin appeared on the threshold of my bedroom, nursing another beer. His baby-blue baseball cap, white t-shirt, and black jeans made him seem as if he was still in college and not a renowned doctor.
Tearing my gaze from Sailor, where she sat strangling her book, I forced a smile. “Just came to grab my spare prescription sunglasses. No idea what I did with the pair that lives downstairs.”
Padding barefoot toward me, he ignored my messily made bed, black bedside tables, chest of drawers, and towers of medical texts and books. I’d renovated this room years ago, hiring two women who did local interior design to hang wallpaper that looked like concrete slabs and install wooden black-out blinds to take it from floral fifties to an industrial loft feel.
“I saw your glasses by the toaster.” He smirked. “You should know by now you can’t lie to me.”
Slouching, I tossed back the rest of my beer. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re a royal pain in the ass?”
“You do.” He clinked his bottle against my empty one. “Daily.” Looking down into my neighbour’s messy garden, he studied Sailor for a moment too long. Finally, he said with kindness instead of scorn, “She’s not looking so good.”
I stiffened as I allowed myself to stare at her again.
She’d given up pretending to read and sat with her face buried in her hands. Her bandaged wrist bulky and awkward, her head bowed as if she was exhausted.
My heart fisted into a knot.
I couldn’t keep looking at her. If I did, I’d do something stupid like go over there.
Forcing myself to move away from the window, I grabbed the case for my spare sunglasses on my dresser and strode in my flip-flops to the door. My black shorts and white tee allowed me to soak up as much vitamin D as possible seeing as I spent most of my life in a hospital. “It’s understandable. She’s brave to want to come back so soon, but it will take time before she feels safe again. You coming?” I arched my chin. “Those wings will be done by now. I’m assuming that’s why you came to find me.”
Abandoning his post by the window, Colin followed me down the stairs to the large foyer and open-plan living. I’d gotten rid of the paisley curtains and shagadelic carpet. I’d stripped off the busy wallpaper and refreshed the walls with off-white and grey.
I might’ve updated every inch of this place over the years, but I still got the feeling that my grandparents would be in the conservatory reading their magazines and newspapers, refusing to enter the digital age with iPads and interwebs.
“I came to find you as I know you.” Colin shrugged and pushed past me. Swinging by the modern wood and marble kitchen, he snagged another beer from the fridge before stepping into the hexagonal conservatory and the deck beyond. “I know you’re worried about her, just like you worried about your folks. You become personally invested in the lives of others and—”
“And you don’t?” I grabbed another beer and joined him on the deck. The scents of charcoal-roasted chicken wings, garlic bread, and creamy potato salad accompanied the late afternoon perfectly. “I’ve seen you take work home all the time. You spent countless hours on that woman’s leg last month, ensuring the knee joint was reinforced so she could keep jumping her horses.”
“I did. But the difference between us is I like the puzzle of how to keep her doing something she loves, while you’d worry about her returning to a sport that made her lose her leg to begin with.” Using the tongs, he loaded up a platter already towering with sausages, juicy steaks, and grilled corn on the cob. “It’s fun for me to figure out ways for a new mechanism to work. Each patient is different with their needs and prosthetics.” Grabbing a sausage, he bit into it and pointed the rest in my face. “The difference between us, Zan, is I don’t worry about their mental health. I’m there to provide a service. A service I’m good at. And they wouldn’t be getting the best of me if I constantly worried about their state of mind while adapting to their new way of life. That’s not my job. My job is to gift that new way of life. The rest is up to them. See where I’m going with this?”
Scowling, I snagged a wing and sat heavily in the wooden deck chair I’d made with my gramps before he passed away. “You’re being pretty heavy-handed, so yes. I see where you’re going.”
“Good.” Finishing his mouthful, he dolloped a spoonful of potato salad onto a plate, tore off some garlic bread, and stacked a dangerously high mountain of wings before taking the seat beside me and tucking in. “Her mental health is not your responsibility. Her wounds were dealt with. Her overseeing physician will see her for a check-up. She has numbers to call if she’s not coping. The only thing you should worry about is how long you should give her before asking her out for a drink.”
I choked on my beer. “You what?”
He chuckled. “Oh, come on. You can’t be that dense or believe I’m that blind.” Biting off a hunk of bread, he said, “You’ve been sneaking peeks for years. You think you’re fooling me, but you’re only fooling yourself. You want her.” Swallowing his large bite, he grinned. “And now she’s finally single, so…how long are you going to wait to remind her that not all men are murderous assholes? That she lives next to one of the best guys I know and—”
“Quit talking while you’re ahead.” Leaping to my feet, I busied myself with loading a plate of food. I was grateful for my sunglasses—not only to block the sun but his far too piercing gaze. “I’m not interested in her in that way. I’m merely keeping an eye on her like her grandmother told me—”
“Yeah, yeah, sure you are. So this grandma of hers specifically told you to stand in a dark bedroom while she’s in hers with her lights on? Did she tell you to freeze each time you see her by the letterbox? Maybe she also told you not to bring women here in case your neighbour sees you with someone else, and it breaks her itty-bitty heart?”
I groaned and sank back into my chair. “ One time I asked to use your place. One time, Col.”
“Because you wanted to fuck and not have your neighbour—”
“No, because I was too exhausted to drive anywhere, and she was tipsy. Your apartment was closer. Nothing happened that night.”
“You’re shitting me.” He raised an eyebrow. “You went home with a super pretty girl from the bar, used my place with its bachelor vibes with a spa tub on the balcony, and still didn’t score?” Leaning toward me, he scowled. “What’s wrong with you?”
“Like I said. She was tipsy.”
“Tipsy isn’t drunk.”
“It’s still not right.” I couldn’t hold his eye contact or stop remembering how the woman in question had tried to instigate sex multiple times throughout the night. And each time, I’d politely but firmly turned her down.
By the time morning came around and she’d sobered up enough to make a rational decision, I’d frustrated her so much by doing the right thing she said I’d ruined her self-esteem, called me a tease, and left.
Which was fine.
Completely totally fine.
I didn’t have time for a girlfriend.
I barely had time for a friend, and we both worked crazy hours, so our relationship came with built-in understanding.
I’d gone into this profession knowing full well I might struggle to balance love and career. I’d chosen it because I was great at what I did, got satisfaction from helping people, and had grown used to being on my own.
So what if I’d completely forgotten what it felt like to be touched by someone? So what if every release I had was by my hand and no one else’s?
I was doing something worthwhile, which made up for the loneliness.
Not that I’m lonely.
Of course not.
I was twenty-nine, owned property with a mortgage covered by rent, inherited a house worth far more than I could ever afford, and most of my education had been paid off thanks to my parents’ life insurance policy when they passed away.
I had no worries in my own life.
Which meant I had plenty of time to give it to other people who might not have as much as I did.
Flicking a look at the fence between my garden and Sailor’s, he sniffed. “If you don’t ask her out, I’ll do it for you.”
“You can’t be serious.”
His eyes hardened. “Deadly serious. I’m sick of you putting yourself last. If this is the only way to get you to think of yourself occasionally, then so be it.”
“She was just strangled by her ex, you idiot. She’s not exactly in the market for a hook-up.”
“So don’t be a hook up.” He devoured a wing. “Be the guy you are. Support her while she’s going through this rough patch. Be her friend first if that’s what floats your boat. God knows you could use another one, seeing as I’m the only one who tolerates you.”
“Get out of my house.” I pointed at the gate with my beer. “You’ve overstayed your welcome.”
He laughed. “Threats don’t work when I know you don’t mean them.”
Sighing heavily, I dumped my plate on the wooden table between us. I tried to gather my thoughts so he wouldn’t ruin my life. “Look, I appreciate your concern—”
“You’re welcome. I figured I better worry about you, seeing as you worry about everyone else.”
“But you have to promise me you won’t go near her, alright? It’s not my place, and it’s sure as hell not yours.”
He sat up and wiped his hands on a napkin. “Not your place? What the hell does that mean?”
“I mean it’s not ethical. I’m a doctor, and she’s a patient and—”
“She’s not your patient. And even if she was, there’s no law saying you can’t date.” He grinned. “That ‘suggestion’ was just some morality clause thrown in to prevent—”
“Predators from preying on injured people.”
“So you’re a predator now?”
“No, I’m—” I cut myself off with a groan. “I’m her neighbour. That’s all.”
“Didn’t you say your grandmothers had dreams of marrying their kids off to each other?”
“They did, and look at how well that turned out. Melody and Rory’s son ran as far away from them as possible, and my parents were childhood nemeses only to somehow defy all odds by getting married at eighteen and staying married.”
“There’re always the grandchildren then. That’s you, by the way. I’m sure you’d make some ghosts very happy if you married the girl next door.”
“Not gonna happen. And if you’re not going to drop this subject, leave.”
“How are your sisters, by the way?” Colin waggled his eyebrows, knowing full well my threats were useless. “Single?”
I relaxed slightly, grateful the topic of conversation no longer included me. “Jolie just had a bad breakup actually, and Christina doesn’t want anything to do with the opposite sex after what her ex did to her, so you’re shit out of luck.”
“Why does it sound as if all the women in your life hate men?” He toasted me with a sausage. “You know, you should start repairing women’s faith in our fair sex by proving to Miss Sailor Neighbour over there that you’re—”
“Done with this.” Standing, I loomed over him. “Pick another subject or forfeit the right to eat this insane amount of food and go home hungry.”
Standing too, he clapped me on the shoulder. “Tell you what.” A dangerous glint appeared in his blue eyes. “I’ll drop all mention of you pining over the girl next door if you make up a plate for her and take it over there.”
“You’ve lost your damn mind.”
“No, I’m saving yours.” He smirked and shoved me toward the table. “You won’t relax if you don’t see for yourself that she’s coping being home. So…here’s your excuse. You’re only being a good neighbour. Take some food. Isn’t that what everyone does around here anyway? Borrowing sugar and baking cakes and shit? I doubt she’s cooked dinner, and this way, you have an excuse to see for yourself that she’s gonna be okay. She doesn’t need you worrying about her on your day off, and then we can get back to the program of drinking and relaxing. Fair?”
I had a sudden impulse to stalk inside the house and slam a door.
But a tantrum wouldn’t get Dr Colin Marx off my case.
He was like a rottweiler with an intruder: he wouldn’t let go until an arm fell off.
“Fine.” I huffed. “But one of these days, I’m going to make you regret this.”
“I look forward to it.”