Brooke was my best friend, a fellow librarian in the school system. Who’d gotten hitched earlier that year. And… busy.
“Um,” I said, gaze sliding back to Maui. “N-no.”
Another pause. And then: “Oh.”
Silence pulsed from his end of the phone. When he spoke again, his tone was even softer than before. “Well, I won’t keep you from your guest. I just… There’s a rumor swirling about that you were the one to find John Doe.”
I flinched as I made my way toward the window overlooking the complex’s parking lot.
“The patron who died,” I said, “they still don’t know who he was?”
I scanned the cars in the parking lot below and the shadowy trees beyond, searching perhaps for evidence of my cloaked follower. Probably a good thing that I didn’t see him since he only appeared when I was about to fall to my death.
“There’s not been a positive ID that I’ve heard of,” he replied. “They say he was younger than us, but they’re citing a heart attack, if you can believe it. But Iamcurious how you got off that elevator before finding your way to the basement of all places.”
“Um,” I said, fingers trailing down the gossamer fabric of my off-white drapes before I went in search of my tea. “There was… a Good Samaritan. He… got me out of the elevator. I followed him down to the basement.”
All of thatwasthe truth, wasn’t it?
“Samaritan,” Peter repeated. “You’re not saying someone boarded the elevator after I disembarked, are you?”
“Disembarked?” I asked through a small huff of a laugh, finding my favorite Stitch mug, the one where the little grinning alien wore a grass skirt and strummed a ukelele. “It was more like you were Double-O-Seven-ing your way out of a viper pit.”
Silence again radiated on his end.
“Listen, Peter,” I said, “I appreciate your concern. I do. But I’m okay. And I don’t need you to check on me. I really am all right.”
“I suppose I feel a bit guilty,” he said. “That I’d only just left you. I can’t help thinking that, if I’d stayed,Icould have done something. I can only be grateful you had help from a stranger. An angel in the flesh.”
I blurted a nervous laugh, which I hoped didn’t hurt his ear. I couldn’t have helped the half-hysterical sound, though. Not when it had come bolting out of me like someone stepping on a raspy squeak toy.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Peter asked.
No. “Of course.”
“Your benefactor,” Peter pressed. “Did you happen to catch his name?”
“There was so much going on. I… It didn’t really come up.”
“No, of course it wouldn’t.”
Silence again emanated from his end. I frowned, staring down into my mug. The citrus tea had lost its steam.
Seemingly just like my interest in Peter.
Which, on the whole, was good information to have.
Apparently, almost dying—twice now—had done something to me. Or maybe the incidents had simply awakened me to the fact that it was folly to want something—someone—who didn’t want me back.
There’d been my rescuer, too. I wasn’t ready to buy into the idea his plans didn’t include reaping my soul at some point in the near future, but then… why rescue me in the first place?
And if my time trulywaslimited, then it would be no one’s fault but my own if I ended up wasting it pining for someone who couldn’t seem to make up his mind regarding how he felt about me.
“I have to go now, Peter,” I said to him. “But… I’ll see you around at work.”
“Helena,” he said. “Listen, Iamsorry.”
I scowled and, turning, pressed my back to the countertop as I again peered toward my window. There was no telling what he was apologizing for. Was he simply offering empathy for what had happened that day? Or, after months of not so much as a how-do-you-do, was he expressing remorse for the coldness he’d shown me on the heels of so many empty promises… and so much heat?
