by Tawna Fenske
Lexi
I stare at Noah, trying to make sense of his words.
I lost Bartholomew.
“But I just saw him this morning,” I say. “He was in the cage.”
It’s then I realize that’s not true. It’s true that I walked into the room with a handful of berries. It’s true I planned to give him breakfast in bed and a good scratch behind the ears.
But I got waylaid by my own suspicions.
“Last night,” Noah says. “After you went to sleep, I got up to feed him like I promised. The latch on the corner—”
“The tricky one,” I say, imagining exactly how it could happen.
“When I came back from the fridge, he was gone,” he says. “I stayed up most of the night combing the house from top to bottom. I’ve been looking all day. He’s gone.”
I blink at Noah, taking in the stricken look on his face. Then I glance toward the front window, reading his thoughts.
“There’s no screen,” I say. “And we never closed the window last night.”
He nods slowly. “I’m sorry, Lexi. I’m thinking he got outside. There’s no other explanation.”
Beside me, Corrie is silent. I don’t blame her. She came here expecting to grab a rodent, shoes, and a cheating man’s testicles. This wasn’t the plan.
She turns to look at me, a rare flicker of uncertainty in her eyes. “You still have those ‘Wanted’ posters? The ones you printed yesterday?”
“I never picked them up,” I murmur. “They’re paid for and everything, but after Noah showed up at the bar, I didn’t have a reason to go get them.”
“I’ll go pick them up,” she says. “We can post them on mailboxes and lampposts around the neighborhood. It’s worth a shot, right?”
I look at Noah, and I can tell we both have the phrase needle in a haystack rattling through our heads. Neither of us says it. But seriously, what are the odds of finding a small rodent in a big suburban neighborhood?
“I already knocked on a few doors,” he says. “And I looked in all the hedges up and down the street.”
“We can form a search party,” I say. “Maybe some of the regulars from the bar. They’re always looking for charity stuff to do.”
Noah nods slowly, and the guilt in his eyes makes my chest ache. “That’s a good idea,” he says.
“I’ll make some calls,” Corrie says. “And I’ll text you when I’m headed back here with the posters.”
I turn back to Noah. “First, maybe we can comb the house again? I know you said you looked, but maybe you missed something?”
I’m relieved when he looks hopeful instead of offended. “Sure, I was just going to check the closet in the office again. And maybe we could search the garage in case he got out there.”
I nod, grateful he’s open to the possibility that Bartholomew is scampering around the house instead of squished in the road. “He’s crafty, so anything’s possible.”
Noah steps back from the front door to let me in, waving to Corrie as she hurries back to her car.
Then we’re alone in his living room.
I take a deep breath and look up at his face. That kind, familiar, crestfallen face. He lifts one hand like he plans to touch me, to brush a strand of hair from my cheek. He stops and drops it to his side again. “I guess we can start in the office—”
“Noah, wait.” I reach out and grab that same hand, praying he doesn’t pull away from me. He has every right. “I’m so sorry. About jumping to conclusions. About assuming the worst about you instead of just asking if you were married.”
He shakes his head and gives an exaggerated grimace. “I can see why you’d think that. It’s our mom’s favorite photo of the two of us, so she gave us each a framed copy. It does look kinda marital.”
“You’re a good guy,” I tell him, squeezing his hand. “And I’m sorry I doubted that. And I’m really sorry I went to talk to your sister at her work. I feel like an idiot.”
He grins and shakes his head. “You’re going to have to tell me all about that conversation,” he says. “I want to hear every word of it. Maybe over dinner Saturday at that new Italian place by the Heathman?”
My heart skips across one rib and lodges in my throat. I blink at him, trying to process his words. “You still want to have dinner with me? After I accused you of being a cheater and then fled barefoot like an insane person?”
He nods and gives me a smile that’s edged with sympathy. “That’s assuming you still want to have dinner with me. After I lost your packrat.”
Bartholomew.
The lump in my throat reminds me this isn’t over. That we still have a crisis to deal with.
But at least we can deal with it together.
“Come on,” I say. “Let’s start looking.”
We start in the back bedroom near the terrarium. There’s a part of me that hopes that while we’ve been talking, he’s crept back into his cage and is sound asleep in the empty butter tub.
That hope shrivels when I lift the top and see nothing but cedar shavings and a little foil gum wrapper.
“I gave him the wrapper that first night,” Noah says a little sheepishly. “He carried it around like I’d handed him the keys to a Ferrari.”
“He always liked gum wrappers.” I wince at my own use of past tense. “Likes. He still does. I’m sure he’s around somewhere.”
Noah nods, but looks less certain. I don’t blame him, since he said he’s been searching for hours. “I’ve already tried the closet, but it’ll go faster if we work together to pull everything out and search again,” he says.
“Let’s start there.”
We stand shoulder to shoulder moving random objects. A badminton set, a box of old yearbooks, a bag of golf clubs. I spot something that looks like a tail up on a high shelf, but it turns out to be the zipper pull on an old letterman jacket. I sigh and start searching a duffel bag filled with baseball gear.
“I’m on a city league team,” he says when he sees me eyeing the jersey. “I play third base.”
I nod and peer into the baseball glove in case Bartholomew is hiding there. No such luck. “I guess after getting trapped in an elevator, the next best thing for getting to know someone is going through their storage closet.”
Noah gives a small smile and continues taking golf clubs out of the bag one by one. “I’m glad you’re here, Lexi.”
“Me, too,” I murmur, and try not to cry.
After the guest room, we move on to the bedroom. My attention wavers as I glance at the bed and remember all the things we did there last night. Heat creeps into my cheeks, and I’m not sure if it’s lust from the memories, or embarrassment over the way I behaved this morning.
“I really am sorry about running out like that,” I tell him again.
He halts in front of his closet and looks at me. “I tried to go after you.”
“Really?”
He gives a sheepish smile. “I got a block away before a neighbor came out and yelled at me to put on some clothes.”
I gape at him. “You took off after me in your boxer shorts?”
He nods, and I’m not sure whether to laugh or cry. Either way, it’s the sweetest thing anyone’s ever done for me. “Come on,” he says. “Let’s start under the bed.”
It’s a far cry from the time we spent on the bed only a few hours ago, but there’s something about crawling through dust bunnies and fishing your hand into someone’s box spring that makes you feel like you know them better.
At one point I think I see movement from the corner of my eye, but it’s just a tree branch fluttering in the breeze outside. We keep going, peering into shoes and pawing through Noah’s impressive T-shirt collection.
&nbs
p; An hour later, we’re dusty and discouraged, but we haven’t lost hope. That’s one thing I’m realizing I love about this guy. He doesn’t give up. He’s determined as hell, whether facing down a purse snatcher or tracking down the paranoid woman he met in an elevator.
“Let’s try the kitchen,” I suggest.
He looks at me oddly. “Have you eaten anything today?”
“A bagel and a latte around ten.” I glance at my watch. “Holy crap, it’s six?”
“I thought I heard your stomach growl. Come on. Let me make you a sandwich.” He holds out a hand, and I take it willingly, glad to let him lead me down the hall to the kitchen. “Is ham and Swiss okay?”
“That would be great,” I tell him. “Want me to cut up one of those apples in the fruit basket?”
He nods and gives me a funny look. “The only other person who cuts up apples for me is my sister,” he says. “I think you two would like each other a lot.”
Embarrassment bubbles in my chest. “You mean when I’m not accusing her of having a philandering husband before admitting I shagged her brother?” I grimace. “I still can’t believe I did that.”
“It didn’t faze her, I promise. Here, look.”
He fishes his phone out of his pocket and hits the “Power” button, then scrolls through his text messages. “This came through when you were in the bathroom earlier.”
I look at the screen and feel a goofy grin start to take hold of my face.
So I met the chick you boned last night. Cute! Maybe a little crazy, but sweet.
I scroll down to see Noah’s response, hoping it’s okay to do that.
Good. I’m crazy about her.
I look up to see him smiling at me, and my own smile widens. “You’re crazy about me, huh?”
He reaches out and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “Don’t let it go to your head.”
I want him to kiss me, but that seems inappropriate now. There’s lunch to make and a packrat to find.
But something warm and solid in my chest tells me there will be other opportunities for that kiss. No matter what happens with Bartholomew, we’ll get through this together.
Noah turns back to the sandwiches, and since I don’t see a knife block on the counter, I pull out a drawer to hunt for something to cut apple slices. I find one drawer filled with pot holders and another with things like sandwich bags and foil.
Foil, Watson whispers. He likes sparkly things.
Harlow nods and gasps. Where else did we see something sparkly?
My brain rewinds, then hits fast-forward. I’m scrolling through images, seeing earrings and hot-dog wrappers and Noah’s tools. When I get to the image of the fireplace, I freeze.
I remember the space high up on the wall where a blanket of obsidian forms a twinkling night sky. My hand drops from the drawer handle, and I’m sprinting for the living room before I have a chance to finish that thought.
“Lexi,” Noah calls. “Are you okay?”
I stare up at the fireplace, letting my gaze move slowly from stone to stone, from nook to cranny, from bottom to top to—
“Oh my God, there’s his tail!”
My shriek sends Noah racing from the kitchen to follow the direction of my finger. He halts behind me with a gasp of surprise.
“How on earth did he—”
“They can climb,” I say. “Packrats can climb. And if he saw something shiny he wanted—”
“What a clever little bastard.”
The tail moves then, slipping behind a rounded river rock. I think we’ve lost sight of him, but then he turns and peers over the edge, whiskers twitching. Relief hits me like a warm wave, and I do my best not to sob from it.
“I think you offended him,” I inform Noah, my voice thick with emotion. “Calling him a bastard and all.”
“I’m sorry, Bartholomew,” Noah calls. “You’re the smartest packrat I know.”
He reappears at the edge of the rock, whiskers twitching, and I give a sobbing laugh as Bartholomew props himself up on his hind legs to inspect a shimmering stone above him.
“I’ll go get a ladder.” Noah dashes through a doorway, but I don’t take my eyes off the little packrat. I’m so damn happy to see him that I’m afraid to break eye contact. Afraid to even blink for fear of losing what I’ve just regained.
That’s not the only second chance you’re getting, Harlow whispers.
Try not to screw it up, Watson grumbles.
I won’t. I swear, I won’t.
Noah returns seconds later with a metal extension ladder flecked with paint but pleasingly rust-free. He begins to raise it, and the clanging noise elicits a startled squeak from Bartholomew.
“Let me go up,” I tell Noah. “He knows me best. I think he’ll come to me.”
“Be careful,” he cautions, but he doesn’t argue when I start up the ladder. “Take it slowly,” he urges. “I’ve got you.”
I didn’t need to hear the words to know that. It’s something I feel with Noah, this bone-deep knowledge that he has my back no matter what. I climb cautiously, taking my time, almost forgetting I’m deathly afraid of heights. Knowing Noah is there to catch me if I fall makes me brave.
Before I know it, I’ve reached the spot where Bartholomew’s twitching whiskers disappeared a few seconds ago. He’s lodged himself on the shelf of a flat river rock just beneath the obsidian sky. I peer over it, rewarded by the twinkle of beady little black eyes looking back at him.
“Hi, there,” I say softly. “We missed you.”
Bartholomew regards me with suspicion. I don’t get the sense he missed me. In fact, he’d probably be happy here for days, perched beneath this sparkling obsidian sky.
“So this is what packrat heaven looks like,” I murmur, edging my hand closer to him. I don’t think he’d be crazy enough to jump, but who knew I’d sprint barefoot down the street? It’s hard to judge what anyone will do when spooked.
I wonder if I should have come up here with a snack of some kind. Something to lure him to me. Then again, he’s not food motivated.
I reach up and slip the silver hoop earring from my right lobe and hold it out, tantalizing him with the shiny shape. Bartholomew’s eyes widen, and he takes a cautious step forward.
“There you go,” I coax. “Just a few more steps.”
As his paws close around the earring, my hand closes over his soft little body. He goes stiff for only a second. Then he relaxes, paws still clutching my earring. “That’s a good boy,” I whisper. “We’re going to head down now. We’ve got snacks waiting for you.”
Climbing down is tricky, with one hand clutching Bartholomew to my chest and the other clinging to the ladder. But I’m not scared. I know Noah’s behind me, and I know Bartholomew is safe in my possession. Everything’s going to be okay.
I know that for certain when I feel Noah’s strong hands close around my hips. I’m one rung from the bottom, and his voice is close to my ear when he speaks. “I’ve got you now,” he says. “You’re safe.”
I turn and meet his eyes, feeling my whole self relax. I lean into him, skimming my lips along his earlobe. “I know I am.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Noah
I can’t stop staring at the door.
It’s Saturday night just before seven, and I’m sitting at a candlelit table in Rizzo’s Ristorante, twitching like a teenager waiting for his first date.
No matter that I’ve gotten to know my date pretty damn well over the last week.
Lexi.
Though I offered to pick her up for our first official date tonight, she insisted on meeting here. “There’s something I need to go grab before dinner,” she said mysteriously. “I’ll meet you at the restau
rant.”
So here I am, staring at the front door with my heart knocking around in my chest like a kettledrum, when Lexi walks in. She doesn’t see me at first, which gives me a chance to study her from a distance. God, she’s beautiful.
She wears a flowy gray sweater over a purple spaghetti-strap dress, and her hair is swept back in a fluffy ponytail on top of her head. The sweater has slipped off her shoulders, leaving them both bare, and I think it might be on purpose. The thought that she might have chosen her outfit with me in mind has me busting into a big, stupid grin.
The second she spots me, her eyes light up. I jump to my feet as she heads toward the table, and I pull her into the biggest, warmest hug I can manage.
“It’s great to see you,” I murmur into her hair. She smells like orange blossoms and sunshine and feels so damn good in my arms. “You look incredible.”
“So do you.” She’s grinning as she pulls back, and it’s then I notice the giant purse. It’s the first time I’ve seen her carrying one like it, and she’s tilting a bit to the side. I slip a finger under the strap, surprised by the weight of it.
“You brought a bag of rocks to dinner?”
It’s a joke, but her eyes widen in surprise. “How did you know?”
She drops the purse between our place settings with a thud, and I grab the edges of the table to steady the wobbling before reaching over to pull out Lexi’s chair, waiting until she sinks into it before I take my own seat.
I glance back at the purse, intrigued. “You’re serious, aren’t you? You brought rocks to dinner?”
She grins like a kid hiding Christmas gifts under her bed, and I can’t help feeling excited. Not just for this date with Lexi, but for whatever surprise she’s cooked up. I peer at the purse and wonder if it’s weird to be this fixated on a woman’s handbag.
“I’ve been thinking about what you said,” she says. “About not finding the right stones for the sun. And it reminded me of my fifth-grade teacher who was really into rock hounding.”