3. Wendy
Wendy
The callused weight of his palm burns through the thin cotton of my vintage band tee.
He doesn't squeeze. He doesn't flex. He simply rests his hand flat against the base of my spine, staking a geographical claim right in front of old Mr. Doolan, who just shuffled in looking for a used jazz pressing.
Heat radiates from his skin, sinking into my vertebrae. It anchors me to the floorboards.
Mr. Doolan sets a cracked sleeve of John Coltrane on the oak counter.
I ring it up. The ancient cash register dings, the mechanical sound unnaturally loud in the narrow shop.
The time, the stranger standing behind me—this "Tom from Portland"—radiates silent menace.
He blocks out the ambient light from the front window.
His black coffee scent overtakes the familiar smell of old paper sleeves and warm dust that usually comforts me.
One warm palm on my spine and he expects me to melt into a puddle behind the counter.
As if. I run a business in the middle of a Syndicate-controlled ghost town.
I stare down mobsters and junkies without smudging my eyeliner.
A brooding giant with a coffee addiction is not going to make me lose my mind.
Except, the sheer gravity of him is doing that. My skin is practically vibrating under his touch. Every nerve ending I possess is hyper-focused on the dimensions of his palm against my lower back.
Mr. Doolan counts out change. He slides the coins across the wood. I scoop them into the drawer, hand him the paper bag, and offer a polite smile.
"Enjoy the Coltrane, Mr. Doolan."
"Always do, Wendy. Always do."
The old man turns and shuffles out. The door closes. The brass bell chimes overhead.
I turn around.
Tyler drops his hand, but he doesn't step back. We’re trapped in the narrow space between the register and the back wall.
"You can holster the meat hook now, Portland," I tell him, crossing my arms over my chest.
He doesn't smile. His eyes—dark, intense, tracking every micro-expression on my face—drop to my mouth, then flick back up. "Cover requires contact."
"The customer was eighty years old and legally blind. He wasn't cross-referencing your DNA to see if we share a family tree."
"Syndicate goons have eyes everywhere. You made me your family. Now we act like it."
"Cousins don't stand that close."
"We do."
His voice is a low rumble that rattles my ribs. I refuse to take a step back, even though his chest is inches from my nose. He’s a wall of muscle and stillness.
"If you’re going to stay in my shop," I point a finger at the center of his chest, "you’re going to learn how to browse. Go pretend to care about the soft rock section."
He stares at my pointing finger. Then he shifts his gaze back to my eyes. He steps around me, his arm brushing my shoulder, and moves out to the main floor.
The afternoon stretches into evening. He doesn't leave the shop. Not even for a second. He spends four straight hours browsing the same three crates near the front window. He’s a terrible actor when it comes to the vinyl.
He slides the sleeves out, staring at the grooves as if reading a foreign language.
But his physical presence is a masterclass in area denial.
Nobody else walks into the shop. The few locals who glance through the glass take one look at the sheer width of his shoulders and keep walking.
Dusk bleeds the light out of Crimson Hollow. The streetlamps flicker on, casting long, dirty shadows across the cracked pavement of Main Street.
I reach past him and flip the OPEN sign to CLOSED. The deadbolt slides home with a metallic thud.
I turn off the overhead fluorescent tubes. Only the amber counter lamp remains, casting a honeyed glow over the rows of records. The vintage turntable behind the counter is spinning a soft acoustic B-side. The crackle of the needle fills the silence.
"You're staying," I say. It isn't a question.
"I'm staying."
I march past him, pushing through the beaded curtain that separates the shop floor from the back room. The plastic beads clack together. He follows right on my heels, ducking his head to clear the low doorframe.
I gesture to the space. It’s small. Cramped.
A single mattress rests on a low wooden frame pushed against the far wall.
A thrifted lamp with a yellowed shade sits on a crate next to it.
Another milk crate holds a secondary record player and a stack of my personal rejects—the B-sides, the scratched masterpieces I play after hours.
Cardboard boxes of unsorted estate-sale vinyl cover the 1920s oak flooring.
The smell of old paper and warm vinyl dust is thick in the air.
"If you're really going to squat here, this is the VIP suite," I tell him, flipping on the thrifted lamp. "No windows. Solid walls. Safe."
He surveys the room. His gaze catalogs the exits, the sightlines, the structural integrity of the walls. He studies the dust patterns on the floorboards. He memorizes the space in less than ten seconds. Then he looks at the mattress.
"Where do you sleep?"
"Upstairs." I point a thumb toward the ceiling. "There's a tiny apartment over the shop. Used to be an office. Now it's mine."
"Door locks?"
"Three deadbolts."
He nods once. "This works."
I stand in the doorway, acutely aware of how small the back room is with him inside it.
His broad shoulders seem to touch the walls.
His presence sucks the oxygen right out of the room.
This shop is my mother's ghost. The smell of the cedar, the meticulous organization by decade, the faded handwritten price tags—she touched all of it.
She died four years ago. I stayed to keep her memory alive.
I anchored myself to this building, and in doing so, I let Crimson Hollow become my cage.
I watched the Syndicate corporatize the streets outside.
I watched the honest businesses board up their windows or burn to the ground.
I have no way out. The Vinyl Vault is what I have left.
Every day is a battle to keep the lights on and the monsters outside.
Now, a stranger is claiming the back room. He’s a human wall between my mother’s legacy and the threats on the street. He doesn't know my mother. He doesn't know my history. But he’s planting his boots on my floorboards and refusing to move.
"Don't touch the B-sides," I warn him, gesturing to the milk crate. My voice is sharper than I intend. A defense mechanism.
His jaw twitches. The faintest ghost of amusement softens the hard lines of his face. "Understood."
"And don't snore. The floorboards are thin. I hear everything from upstairs."
"I don't snore."
"Good." I linger for a second longer than necessary. His eyes hold mine. The heavy, gravitational pull between us drags at my limbs. I want to step toward him. I force myself to step backward. "Goodnight, Portland."
"Goodnight, Wendy."
The first night passes in a tense, buzzing static.
I sleep in my apartment upstairs, but sleep is a generous word for staring at the ceiling fan.
Every creak of the ancient floorboards confirms there’s a man downstairs.
A dangerous man who didn't flinch when the Syndicate walked in. I’m consumed by his presence beneath me.
The gravity of him reaches right through the floor joists.
I’m awake at four-thirty. The sun is a distant rumor behind the eastern ridge. I pull on a pair of faded jeans and an oversized cardigan, walking down the narrow wooden stairs to the shop.
I expect him to be asleep on the mattress.
He isn't.
He’s sitting on a stool behind the oak counter in the dark. Only the amber lamp is on. He has a steaming mug of black coffee in his hands. The scent of dark roast fills the space, dominating the room. He’s still, his eyes locked on the front door.
"Do you ever sleep?" I ask, stepping off the bottom stair.
He tracks my movement with dark, unreadable eyes. "Sometimes."
"Not tonight?"
"Establishing the perimeter."
I roll my eyes. Establishing the perimeter. Right. Military grunts and their buzzwords. I walk into the back room. The mattress is perfectly made. The blanket is tight enough to bounce a quarter off it.
I grab a small carton of eggs from the mini-fridge in the corner and set up the electric hot plate I keep on a sturdy wooden crate. I crack four eggs into the skillet. The smell of melting butter mixes with his coffee. The sizzle of the eggs is the only sound in the building.
I scrape the eggs onto two paper plates. I walk back out to the counter and slide one plate across the oak surface. I drop a plastic fork next to it.
"Eat."
He looks at the pale yellow eggs. He looks at me.
"Unless Portland cousins are too good for hot-plate breakfasts," I add, leaning my elbows on the counter.
He picks up the fork. He eats the eggs in three huge bites. He doesn't say thank you. He doesn't need to. The silence between us isn't awkward. It’s taut. We’re two people sitting inside a trap, waiting for the jaws to snap shut.
I take my plate and eat slowly. The rhythm of the morning solidifies. This is our new normal.
The days blur together in a strange, hyper-vigilant routine. He learns the physical layout of the shop with terrifying precision. He knows which floorboards creak near the jazz section. He knows the blind spot behind the new arrivals display. He never walks into the back room the same way twice.
The claustrophobia of the Vinyl Vault should drive me insane. My routine used to be solitary. For years, it was just me, the records, and the ghosts. Now, every square inch of the shop is saturated with him.
When I sort the estate sale boxes, he’s there.
He sits on a stool near the front window, his long legs stretched out, his dark eyes tracking every vehicle that passes on Main Street.
He tracks me, too. The weight of his stare presses against my skin when I climb the stepstool to reshelve the blues section. My neck heats under the scrutiny.