Hey, remember that time you caught me committing a felony and then bandaged my arm without asking? Cool. So now I’ve escalated that by smuggling the evidence into my pet-free apartment, and I needyourapartment as a temporary hideout.
He’s going to kill me.
Waffles lets out this soft little huff that I take as encouragement.
I lift my hand.
And knock.
Because sometimes rock bottom has cheekbones and a coffee addiction and lives in a fourth-floor corner unit.
And sometimes you’re so out of options, you’re willing to knock anyway.
Chapter Nine
Rowan
There are exactly three things I hate more than being woken up before eight a.m.
One of them is dogs.
The second is surprises.
The third is Tessa Whitmore.
So, when my doorbell rings at 7:32 a.m.—a full twenty-eight minutes before the world should be legally required to exist—I already know who it is.
No one else rings that hesitant and erratic. It’s like she can’t even execute the simplest task without turning it into a crisis.
I don’t move.
I sit at the kitchen island in yesterday’s T-shirt, coffee cooling beside my tablet, and stare at the door. If I wait long enough, maybe she’ll give up. Maybe she’ll take her mess back where it belongs. But I know better. Tessa doesn’t quit.
The bell rings again. Then three sharp taps.
She’s unraveling out there. Good. She should know I don’t answer for free.
I count off ten more seconds in silence. Because whatever she’s about to drag into my morning is already a complication.
When I finally open the door, it’s exactly what I expected.
Oversized hoodie. Cheeks red. Eyes too wide.
And in her arms beneath the hoodie?—
“I told you to get rid of that dog.”
Before she can answer, said dog sneezes.
She winces.
And just like that, my morning is officially over. “No.”
“You don’t even?—”
“No.”
“But—”
