Page 8 of No Good Fight

Quiet wrong… like someone is here. Watching me.

My stomach tightens as the fear creeps in.

The apartment is dark except for the kitchen light glowing faintly near the stove.

I stop moving, cataloging what feels wrong.

I know I turned that light off before I left.

Slowly, carefully, I look around and try to figure out where the nearest weapon is and if someone is here.

Nothing appears disturbed or broken or moved.

The couch looks normal, with all of my pillows and the throw blanket exactly where I left them before I got the alert on my phone about the fire.

My laptop still sits open on the kitchen island, asleep with the screen black.

Everything seems exactly where I left it.

But every instinct in my body starts screaming anyway.

Run. Get out.

Then I notice the bedroom window.

Open, a precise three inches.

Cold air drifts softly through the screen.

Terror crashes into me instantly.

Because I know⁠—

I know⁠—

I locked that window before I left.

Even if I mistakenly left the light on and just think I turned it off. Even if I’m hallucinating and afraid for no reason because of everything else, I know I didn’t leave the window open.

And standing there alone in my apartment with my pulse hammering violently against my ribs as I slam the window shut, I’m forced to face a realization that turns my blood cold.

Somebody has been inside my home.

2

RYDER

I notice the window before Alex even steps inside her apartment. It’s a problem for a lot of reasons.

The first is that I’m not supposed to be here.

The second is that there’s no good explanation for how I know Alex keeps the second window from the left locked unless she’s home and airing the place out while she works, which she sure as hell wouldn’t be doing at three forty-seven in the morning when it’s cold enough outside for condensation to make the pavement glitter.

The third is that I shouldn’t be close enough to have noticed the window was open in the first place.

Which means whatever careful, respectable distance I’ve convinced myself exists between watching out for her and watching her is starting to feel like bullshit.

Just like every night, I lightly tap the brakes of my truck before I reach her building, rolling past the parking lot once with the headlights dimmed. Then I go home. That’s my routine. But tonight, seeing that window open has my heart doing something it didn’t do during that entire goddamn fire call.