AllFreeNovel
Share Us
And black filled her vision.
She woke with the sun shining through the windows, a softrap-rap-rapon the glass pricking through her ears.
Every inch of her body was sore, including her head pounded as she lifted it off…her duffle bag? She glanced around, remembered she wasn’t in Connor’s place, that she was in that fabulous beach house with the many,manystairs. Apparently, the entryway had served as her bed overnight.
Yay her.
RIP her broken, healing body.
Rap-rap-rap.
“Christ,” she muttered, lifting up further, and swear to fuck, if she’d rented a house for the next two months with a freaking woodpecker issue then she was going to lose her absolute mind.
Rap-rap-rap.
A groan and she pushed to sitting, rolled to her knees.
Bum lungs, healing wounds, she didn’t care. She’d take a fucking broom to that bird—
Her gaze caught on the little pane of glass to the left of the door, and she shrieked, tumbled back onto her ass, pain shooting through her as her hands came up and clamped to her chest.
There was a face pressed to the glass,Here’s Johnnystyle.
“Sweet Christ,” she muttered, awake now and thus more lucid—or at least lucid enough to realize that the face pressed to the glass wasn’t a serial killer coming for her…unless that serial killer was a little old lady with curly white hair, bright blue frames on her glasses, and a shocking swathe of pink lipstick.
Grunting, she made it back to her hands and knees, struggled up to her feet, using one to shove back her bags enough so that she had room to open the door.
“Hi,” she said and then promptly cleared her throat because she sounded like she’d gone twelve rounds in a shouting match and was left with a loss (anda rasp). “Can I help you?” she asked, tugging the wooden panel wide enough to see the woman’s purple sweatshirt had three puppies printed on the front. It was paired with black slacks and running shoes. And a plethora of gemstone necklaces hanging around her neck.
“It’s ten o’clock in the morning.”
Raven blinked, her eyes immediately going to the horizon, noting that the position of the sun reinforced that assertion.
Yup. The big ball of gas was right there in front of her, preparing to blind whoever was dumb enough to stare at it.
“Um,” she murmured. “Okay.”
“It’s ten o’clock in the morning and you were passed out on the floor,” the woman said, lowering her chin and staring up at her through the frames of her glasses with piercing blue eyes. “Do you have a drinking problem? I don’t like neighbors—temporary or otherwise—with drinking problems.”
Okay, well, that had taken a turn Raven hadn’t expected.
And why was the woman asking about her drinking, anyway? She scrubbed a hand over face, feeling more tired than if she’d just finished a twenty-four-hour shift that had kept her moving from start to finish, and when that didn’t bring any clear answers, asked, “I—what?”
Another piercing look before that gaze went behind Raven, dropped to the floor. “It’s ten in the morning, and you’re asleep on your luggage. Did you drive here drunk?”
Finally, the fog began to clear.
Here’s Johnnyto a purple puppy sweatshirt to the sun shining in her eyes to questions about her drinking—which admittedly, Raven liked to pop open more than her fair share of wine bottles, but this conversation was giving her whiplash.
“I didn’t drive here drunk,” she said, deciding to start with the last question and go from there.
The woman’s head tilted. “Then why are you asleep on your luggage?”
She carefully lifted her arm to shove back her bangs. “I was really tired when I got in last night.”
The woman paused, those piercing blue eyes freezing Raven in place again. “Really tired?” she asked archly.
Raven took a breath, trying to decide how much to say in order to get to this woman to go away. Raven’s personal business was her business, of course, but this was a neighbor, and she didn’t want to start day one of a two-month stay with a problem.
