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His head had turned to the side to avoid the glare, and she saw it then, the scar at the base of his throat, evidence of the bullet that had nearly taken his life. Letting out a breath, he squinted upward again. “I came here looking for you.”
CHAPTER 22
Noah winced. Damn, that light was harsh.
“Looking for me?” Remmi repeated in a voice that brought back memories of hot summer nights two decades earlier. For a second, she seemed stunned. He wasn’t sure she believed him. “Looking for me? Are you kidding me? After all this time?”
“Yes. Now, can we get out of the rain? And turn off that damned light.”
“Go inside? Are you crazy? I don’t even know you anymore!”
“Sure you do—” Rain was seeping under his collar, and still she kept that garish, painful flashlight trained on him. He closed his eyes for some relief and was vaguely aware of the start of an engine, a car driving off.
“It’s been twenty years, Noah!” Her voice was tight. “No, we’re not getting out of the rain. What the hell are you doing here?”
She certainly was the girl he remembered, full of piss and vinegar, a smart, pretty girl who’d been sassy and intellectual and ready to take a dare at a moment’s notice. He surmised she hadn’t changed all that much.
“I saw you on TV,” he explained. He could rush her, of course—the illumination wasn’t completely crippling—but he didn’t want to scare her any more than he already had. “You were in the crowd at the Montmort when the woman jumped.”
“So?”
> “I was looking for you anyway. I’d just found out you were in San Francisco. Then there you were, on TV.”
“You expect me to believe that?” she scoffed.
“It’s the truth, for God’s sake. Now, can you switch that thing off!”
She hesitated, said something unintelligible under her breath, but snapped off the flashlight, the staircase becoming immediately pitch dark, no image visible for a few seconds as his eyes adjusted.
“I don’t appreciate being stalked,” she said.
“What? Stalked? I’m not—”
“You could have rung the bell downstairs,” she argued, cutting him off. “You know, like a normal person? I mean, how did you even know I was up here? On the third floor?”
“I saw the lights go on.”
“There it is!” she said. “What I said: stalker.”
He held up a hand as his vision returned and he saw how angry and scared she was. He hadn’t meant to frighten her. “Look, I know other people live in the house.” She started to argue again, accuse him, but he broke in, “Yes, I did check that out.”
Her scowl deepened, and she still held the flashlight as if it were a weapon, clutching it tightly in one fist as if ready to strike.
“I didn’t want to bother them.”
“Even though it’s not that late, other lights are on, and again, it’s the normal thing to do.”
“Okay, next time I’ll do it the normal way. Even though there’s not much normal about us,” he said dryly, looking up at her, icy drops of rain running down his face.
“Us,” she repeated. From the higher landing, he could see her glare down at him. “You show up here, out of the blue, after seeing me on TV . . . after twenty years.”
Noah’s pupils returned to normal, and the lights of the city, low and muted by the rain, came into his vision again. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Then use the front door.”
“Okay. Okay. Should I go down there now and ring the doorbell?”
She didn’t appreciate his sardonic tone. “Maybe.”
