“I dunno. They’ve got issues.”
~*~
There was a distinct chance the personal, silent tension between them would reach a tipping point in the midst of going through the house, and Fox would be forced to physically separate them, but he knew he didn’t have to tell his two proteges to step lightly and keep touching to a minimum. A glance, once they’d picked the lock on the side door, proved they’d both pulled on leather gloves without prompt.
Good boys, he thought with an inner surge of satisfaction, and tugged on his own.
“Take it they didn’t entertain much,” he said, examining the kitchen. A scuffed, Formica-topped table and three mismatched chairs sat in the center of the room, but aside from a fridge in one corner and a microwave on the counter, the rest of the room was bare.
Tenny pulled open an upper cabinet to reveal dust and dead moths.
Reese headed into the next room, and Fox followed.
Here there was moldy, stained carpet, mashed down from decades of foot traffic, and a sagging old sofa with a plastic slip cover. A TV – the old console kind, a lamp perched on top of it. One that clicked on, when Fox tested it: someone had paid the power bill recently enough that it hadn’t been shut off yet.
They found a grungy bathroom, and two bedrooms, each with bare mattresses on the floor. A few stray articles of clothing: a sock, a black t-shirt.
Fox picked the latter up, and sniffed it. “Sweat. And blood.” He held out a hand. “Let’s have a bag.”
Reese produced one, and passed it over.
“There’ll be DNA all over it.” He tucked it under his arm, and kept looking.
It became quickly apparent, though, that there wasn’t anything else to find. The bathroom cabinets held basic first aid supplies, mouthwash, and a few grubby towels; some rolls of toilet paper. They found beers in the fridge, along with ketchup, mustard, and mayo; a still in-date package of ham. Bread moldered in the pantry cabinet. But there weren’t any humans here, and Fox doubted there would be again.
On their last pass through, Tenny made an amused sound from over by the TV.
Fox paused in the doorway. “What?”
Tenny had crouched down, half behind the old console set, his back to the threshold. Reese stood a few paces behind him, his shoulders squared, and his bandaged hands curled into fists that had to hurt. Fox spared the boy a moment’s fleeting sympathy. There was a longing in him, too, even plainer, though perhaps more innocent than Tenny’s. A hurt, and a confusion. For all that he was easier to manage, and always more level-headed in a tight situation, he was still far less worldly. He was taking rejection hard, but he still didn’t understand, Fox didn’t think, that it was a rejection born of fear and self-denial, rather than any true hatred.
Twenty-Nine
Leah spent most of her afternoon online furniture shopping, browsing, mostly, though she did order some new bamboo window shades. She wanted to have her kitchen redone, but that would require professional help. She looked at tile and countertop samples until she was cross-eyed, and finally set the laptop aside to realize that evening was coming on strong, the shadows long and buttery across the floorboards, and that she’d skipped lunch and was starving. She wondered what Carter was doing; wondered how difficult his club errand had been.
As if summoned, her phone dinged with a text alert, and she scrambled for it across the coffee table.
It was Carter:Long day. We can still do dinner out, if you want. Or I can bring takeout and come over.
Immediately, butterflies fluttered in her stomach. She wanted to equate the feeling to when she’d first started dating Jason, but it had never been like that with him, only a low, pleasant warmth at being seen and listened-to. You could build a relationship on that, a life, even; for a long time, she’d thought she would. Thinking about Carter – now that she’d stopped denying herself and truly opened the door to the possibility – left her breathless and heated in a whole new, thrilling, cliché way that was nevertheless intoxicating.
Takeout’s good, she texted back.
Be there in 30.
She realized he hadn’t asked for her address, but that he probably hadn’t needed to: the rest of the guys knew it, Ava, too.
She shivered, and went to freshen up.
She had a minor crisis standing in front of her closet. What did one wear for a not-date in her own home with the boy who’d kissed her a few hours ago in a parking lot?Long day, he’d said, and it was just takeout, and it was justCarter, even if her pulse was pounding. She decided on casual: yoga pants and a bright orange t-shirt. She took her hair down, and shook it out; touched up her lipstick, a soft peach that wasn’t too loud for the occasion.
She straightened her bedspread and plumped her pillows for good measure. “Wishful thinking,” she muttered to herself, but was grinning.
A knock sounded at her front door ten minutes later, and she opened it to find Carter standing on her new welcome mat, two paper bags from Stella’s in his arms.
There was a moment, before she found her voice and invited him in, when their gazes locked, and it hit her all over again, like it had that morning, in the few heartbeats before he stepped in close and touched her face. This was him. This was her. This was happening, when neither of them had ever anticipated such a thing. She wondered if the unexpected quality of it was what made it so thrilling – or if the thrill was long overdue. If this was always supposed to happen. She didn’t believe in fate, so she guessed there was no way of knowing.
Then she pushed the door wide and stepped aside. “Hey, come in. Wow, how did you carry all that on your bike?”
