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Just as the doors open, he lobs another question. “Who’s the guy who helped me out?”
Not sure how to categorize JL, I pause. “He’s a karaoke buddy. Not the best start to the evening.” I move into the car before the doors slide shut and push the button for the third floor. No more questions, at least not until I call Cress. Besides the tacky feeling as I walk across the marble floor, my feet are icy. I run down the hall, fling open the door, and slide into the fuzzy slippers waiting next to the opening.Bliss.
Once inside the palatial condo I call home for the moment, I wrestle out the phone trapped between the couch cushions. It landed there when I threw it down and ran out the door after calling 911. Then I walk into the bedroom and throw myself onto the bed.
“Hey, Siri. Call Cress.”
“Calling Cress,” the obedient bot responds.
She answers almost immediately. “Micki?” Her voice is breathless with concern. How could she have heard anything yet? Unless JL called Max on his way to the police station.
“Why are you upset?” I ask.
“We’re supposed to meet you at Stanley’s, and you’re calling. Something must be wrong.”
Cress always imagines the worst, although in this case she’s not wrong. Her intuitive leaps are too much. I rub the small of my back, trying to dispel the creepy crawly feelings up and down my spine.
I take a deep breath, then plunge in. “Sam found me, somehow, and laid siege to the building.”
“He what?”
“Laid siege to the building,” I repeat, trying to keep the impatience out of my voice.
“What the hell does that mean?”
Rolling over to my stomach, I groan. “You’re pretty obtuse for a historian. I assumed you knew what a siege was.”
“I do, but he’s only one guy. Sieges are conducted by armies. Over long periods of time.”
“He’s an army of one. Throwing rocks at the building, bellowing threats. Like ‘Monty Python and the Holy Grail.’”
She sniggers. “‘Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!’”
I hoot. “‘Go away before I taunt you a second time.’”
“Rocks and epithets. Anything else?”
“He attacked the doorman when he came out to quell the disturbance. I saw it all from my window and called the police. By the time they arrived, JL was on the scene. Sam broke his nose, but JL broke Sam’s jaw. EMTs took him to the hospital.”
“Sam or JL, or both?”
“Sam. JL had to go to the police station.”
“Why?”
“He had to make a statement about what happened. Pretty standard procedure.”
“Oh my God.” She’s hyperventilating. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, unlike the combatants.”
“JL’s with you, then? Are you canceling?” She sounds disappointed. I’m surprised since karaoke isn’t her thing.
“I told you, he’s at the cop shop, telling his story.”
“Sam’s in jail??”
“Not sure if they arrested him already or if they’re waiting until after the doctors wire his jaw. Anyway, JL suggested you and Max should pick me up. He’ll meet us there.”
