by Ashlyn Chase
Copyright
Copyright © 2010 by Ashlyn Chase
Cover and internal design © 2010 by Sourcebooks, Inc.
Cover design by Kathleen Lynch/Black Kat Design
Cover illustration © Monika Roe
Sourcebooks and the colophon are registered trademarks of Sourcebooks, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from its publisher, Sourcebooks, Inc.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.
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Contents
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Cover
To my family of origin. You made me who I am today. Sort of. Don’t worry; I’m not blaming you for the warped parts. You may not be able to see what I’ve done with my life—or maybe you can, I don’t know—but I can’t let a little thing like death stop me from appreciating you the best way I know how. Mom, Dad, Dex…this one’s for you.
Chapter 1
“Here are your keys, dear. Thanks for coming upstairs to get them. Now don’t let your neighbor across the hall scare you.”
Roz Wells took the key from Dottie, the apartment manager, and froze. “Scare me? Why would he or she scare me?”
“He’s Nathan Nourie.” She stepped closer to Roz and whispered, “I call him Nasty Nathan, and I assumed he might scare you because he scares me. I’m told he’s harmless, but…oh, well, I don’t want to influence your opinion by relating my own harrowing experiences.”
“Harrowing?” Oh my freakin’ God. “What’s wrong with Nathan?”
“That’s what I’d like to know. All I can tell you is he works in a morgue and has an odd sense of humor. Downright morbid, if you ask me.”
Maybe she’s just easily freaked out. “Okay, that doesn’t sound so bad.”
Dottie folded her arms and humphed. “You haven’t met him yet. If I told you everything…but I won’t. I wouldn’t want to prejudice you.”
“No, of course not.” Roz rolled her eyes.
“In fact, most of the tenants here may take some getting used to. If I were you, I’d stay away from the women in 3B, too.”
“Why? What wrong with them?”
“Well, they seem to have gotten better lately, but they used to scream and holler all the time. Oh, and don’t get me started on my neighbor right across the hall here, Konrad Wolfensen, unless you like nudists. But you’re on the first floor, so you shouldn’t have to see what I’ve seen. I swear to God, my eyes can never un-see that.”
Roz wondered if leaving her comfortable apartment in Allston and moving to Boston proper had been a good idea, but she wanted to keep an eye on her best friend Merry, having learned her new husband’s secret.
She’d confided in her last winter. Merry said she was marrying a shapeshifter, and as crazy as it sounded, Merry was the most down-to-earth and stable person Roz had ever known. There had to be something to it, and Roz needed to know that her best friend in the world hadn’t made a horrible mistake.
“Well, thanks for the warning.” I think. “Oh! I almost forgot to tell you…you know that I’m Merry’s friend, right?”
“Which is why you were standing next to her at her wedding and why you knew her apartment was available before I advertised it. Yes, I remember.”
“Please don’t tell her I moved in. I want it to be a surprise.”
Dottie shrugged. “Suit yourself. She’ll be in Florida with my nephew while he’s in spring training. You know her husband, star pitcher for the Boston Bullets, is my nephew, right?”
Roz gave her a sardonic smile. “I may have heard about that.” Like each time I’ve heard you talking.
The door across the hall clicked open and a familiar-looking, gorgeous blond hunk stepped out of his apartment. A short-sleeved black T-shirt exposed luscious biceps and stretched across massive, taut pectoral muscles. When he turned around to lock his door, Roz noticed his tight butt and hair so long it almost reached his waist.
Don’t drool, don’t stare, don’t drool…
“Oh, hello, Konrad,” Dottie said with syrupy sweetness. “I was just welcoming our new resident.”
Some welcome.
“This is Rosalyn Wells. Rosalyn, this is Konrad.”
I wish I could shed thirty pounds twenty seconds ago. A hottie like him would never be interested in a lump like me.
“Oh, you’re Merry’s friend.” He nodded at the key in her hand. “Are you moving into 1B, her old apartment?”
“Yes, I am.” Why, oh why did I wear my oldest, rattiest sweatpants today?
“I remember meeting you at the burger restaurant a few months ago, and then I saw you again when you were Merry’s maid of honor. You looked ravishing in that blue dress, by the way.”
Roz was taken aback. Oh, no, he isn’t gay, is he? Good-looking, sensitive, notices and remembers details; sheesh. It’s always the good looking ones. But I’ll take a compliment wherever I can get it.
Merry was usually the one who attracted male attention. Roz had never considered herself memorable in the least. Her figure was less than svelte, and her dark brown hair was too straight to hold a style. She usually just swept it back into a bun for work. At least she liked her eyes. They were big and blue, but her eyeglasses hid them. Wearing glasses gave her an authoritative appearance, good for the courtroom, but lousy for dating. “You remember me?”
“Of course I remember you. Welcome to our humble abode, Rosalyn.”
He extended his hand, and she grasped it. His big warm paw held hers in a surprisingly gentle clasp. Some kind of energy passed between them, something she’d never felt when shaking the hand of a colleague.
“Call me Roz.”
“I’d hardly call this building humble,” Dottie said. “That chandelier in the foyer must have cost my nephew a fortune.”
“That chandelier has been there since my hair was short. Your nephew just bought the building when? Last summer?”
Suddenly the crystals in the chandelier downstairs tinkled and clanged together.
Dottie jammed her hands on her hips. “For God’s sake, Chad, haven’t you gone into the light yet?”
Konrad elbowed Roz’s arm. “Chad is our resident ghost.”
Dottie rolled her eyes. “Yes, God forbid I leave him out when telling you about the other residents.”
“There’s a g-ghost haunting the building?” What kind of fresh hell did I just get myself into?
“Yes, but he won’t bother you if he likes you,” Konrad said. “I didn’t even k
now he was here until the séance.” Konrad looked at the chandelier. “You leave the new woman alone, all right, Chad? She’s a friend of Merry’s.”
Nice of him to intervene for me, but…The back of Roz’s neck prickled. “You held a séance?”
“Sure, didn’t Merry tell you?”
“No. I think I would have remembered that.”
Dottie shook her head. “She was the only resident who couldn’t make it, besides my husband. She said she had to work. My husband said he had to keep an eye on the building. I don’t know where he thought it was going. Well, I have work to do now, but before I leave you, Roz, you should know that I’m not happy with loud parties or tenants who cause trouble. And I live right above you.”
Konrad leaned toward Dottie. “Is that some kind of threat? I don’t recall her saying she’s a party animal.”
Wow, is Konrad this protective of all the tenants, or is it just me? Nah, he and Dottie probably have some kind of history. “Oh, you don’t have to worry about me,” Roz said quickly. “I live a quiet life.” Not by choice…
“Good. We’ll get along swell, then.”
Dottie gave Konrad a dirty look, stepped into her apartment, and closed the door.
“Can I help you move in? I’m pretty strong.” He flexed his sizeable muscles.
Holy Christmas! I haven’t seen muscles like that in…ever! Whoa, didn’t Dottie say he was a nudist? What I wouldn’t give to see…but no. Even if he showed me his, I’d never show him mine.
“Weren’t you headed somewhere else?” Roz asked.
“No. Would you rather I was?”
She chuckled. “Of course not. I just thought…oh, never mind. It’d be nice to have company while I wait for the movers.”
***
“Hi, new kid.” Chad followed Roz down the stairs. Most of the residents seemed like kids to him. After all, he’d been haunting the place since the 1960s. Okay, so Konrad was older, but he was a werewolf. Other than Konrad, not even the super, Ralph, or his wife Dottie, or the vampire Sly could claim Chad’s age or experience.
“That’s right, kid, we have a vampire. The only reason the landlady didn’t mention him was because she doesn’t know he’s living in the basement. Heh, heh.
“I’ll bet you thought I was swinging from the chandelier, didn’t you, kid? As much fun as that would be, I’m afraid my astral body doesn’t work that way. It’s not like I have an invisible body. I’m a spirit. That means I have no astral ass to sit on.
“But just like a corporeal person who loses one sense and strengthens the others, I may have lost my body, but I’ve strengthened my mind to razor sharpness. Yeah, I’m smart as shit.
“Ha, ha. I wish. Actually I’ve learned to use my mind to affect objects, so even though I wasn’t literally swinging from the chandelier, I concentrated really hard on the chandelier swinging until it did. It’s called telekinesis. If I were able to ride it, I’d do it every day until the damn thing came crashing down. You have no idea how badly I need entertainment.”
Chad followed Roz into her empty apartment, continuing to chat at her, as though she could hear every word. After all, he never knew when he might run into a sensitive soul who could sense, hear, or see his presence.
Roz glanced up at Konrad. “I just want to take a quick look around to figure out where I’m going to put things when the movers come.”
“Would you like me to step outside?”
“Only if you want to.”
Chad continued, still hopeful. “The others in the building don’t know much about me, except Morgaine and Gwyneth. They’re the witches in apartment 3B, and they’re noisy because they’re phone-sex actresses. Some of their clients like screamers.”
Still no reaction from the new tenant. Damn. I like making Dottie and Ralph’s ceiling fan spin around. Dottie thinks I’m riding it, and Ralph, who doesn’t believe in ghosts, scratches his head and tries to find a logical explanation. A short in the wiring? Oh, come on. It wouldn’t work at all, if that happened.
Roz pulled on her hoodie sweatshirt and fumbled for the zipper. “It’s cold out. Don’t you want to get a jacket?”
Konrad shook his head. “Nah, I’m good.” He opened the apartment door as wide as it would go and said, “Hang onto this a minute.” He carried over the marble pedestal table from the foyer and propped the door open, presumably to carry furniture through it.
Roz shivered. “It’s freezing in here, too, but I’d better wait to turn the heat on. Otherwise it’ll all just rush outside.”
Oh, maybe she sensed me! Chad floated in front of her and made a scary face. “Muu haua huaha. Damn, I hope you’re sensitive and just ignoring me because we’re not alone. I’m sick of talking to myself all the time.”
Konrad opened the front door for Roz and held it as she stepped right through Chad to the outside. Disappointed, he floated back upstairs, hoping to find one of the witches to talk to.
***
Roz and Konrad settled on the front stoop. Konrad sat so close that Roz could feel his body heat radiating into her skin. It felt oddly comforting.
Konrad spoke first. “I heard Dottie giving you her take on the neighbors, and thought I’d try to put your mind at ease.”
“You heard her? Right through your apartment? I didn’t realize we were speaking loudly, or are the walls that thin?”
“No, I—uh, seem to have extra acute hearing.”
And kind of cute ears, slightly pointed at the ends. “So, about the neighbors…they’re not as bad as she thinks they are?”
“They’re not bad at all. Dottie’s the crazy one, if you ask me.”
“How so?”
“Always sticking her nose into other people’s business. She acts like she has to protect her nephew’s investment or something. Like one of us is about to burn the place to the ground at any moment.”
Roz reeled back. “Why would anyone do that? You live here too.”
“Exactly.”
She shook her head. “Well, you don’t have to worry about her influencing my judgment. I’m an attorney. I form my own opinions based on evidence, not hearsay.”
“Sheesh, you even sound like a lawyer.”
She chuckled. “Comes with the territory, I guess. But I wish I could find some other lucrative line of work.”
“Really? Why? Isn’t law fulfilling?”
Wow, he seems genuinely interested. How rare is that in a man? Plus kind and good looking. Maybe living here won’t be so bad, even if he turns out to be gay. Maybe we could go shopping together. “Well, to tell you the truth, the job is changing me in ways I don’t like.”
“Ah. You’re becoming jaded.”
“You said it. That, and it’s no fun. I wish I could find a job that I could be passionate about and have fun while I’m doing it.”
“I get that. I’d like the same thing. So what type of law do you practice?”
“I’m a public defender, low on the totem pole, so I get all the weird cases. Tomorrow night’s the full moon. I can hardly wait to see what the next day will bring.”
Konrad laughed. “Imagine that, Roz Wells gets the weird cases. You must have some stories to tell.”
“Yeah, too bad about that attorney-client privilege thing.”
“Oh, come on. You can talk in generalities. Some of those stories probably wind up in the news anyway.”
“True.”
“Give me some examples of full-moon cases.”
She sighed. “Well, there are the usual extraterrestrial sightings, but with what I call the loonies, there’s always an unusual twist.”
“Like zealots with shotguns wearing tin foil hats for protection?”
She chuckled. “Yeah, or like one time when a guy claimed to see a spaceship melting. Funny how it happened on a hot day on a tar road.”
“Ah, so he was seeing a mirage?”
“Probably. I didn’t hear about any melted spaceships.”
“Why did he need a lawyer? It’s not a
gainst the law to report an extraterrestrial sighting.”
“But shooting out the windows of a ‘melting’ minivan is kind of frowned upon.”
Konrad’s laugh was deep, sort of like Santa Claus without the “Ho, ho, ho.”
“The moon isn’t full every night. What do you do the other twenty-seven days?”
“If it’s not the nuts, then it’s the dregs of society. Drug dealers who hang around playgrounds getting into turf wars with the pedophiles, each one claiming the same street corner. Once I had a not-so-bright client who called the cops on the druggies, only to be picked up himself for violating his parole. And of course there are the vandals who like to show off their colorful vocabulary by hating a particular subgroup in graffiti.”
“Yeah, that doesn’t sound like a barrel of laughs, but you knew it wouldn’t be, right?”
“Sure, I knew I’d meet my share of dirt bags. But I also pictured the occasional innocent person I could really help. Most of the time the son of a bitch is probably guilty and lying his head off, but everyone deserves a fair trial, presumed innocent until proven guilty, right?”
“Right.”
She shook her head. “That assumption is rapidly evaporating. Now I look at a defendant and the first thing that pops into my mind is, ‘What the hell did this one do, and what line of bull is he going to feed me?’”
“You could go into a different type of law practice.”
“I already have. I used to do civil law. Lots of nasty divorce cases.”
Konrad groaned. “Don’t tell me. Now you think all men are scum.”
“Not anymore. It took a while to find the old die-hard romantic in me, but I eventually did. Now I think all men are criminals.”
Konrad laughed, but there was a nervous edge to it. He scratched the back of his neck, uncrossed his long legs, and crossed them the other way.
Roz stretched to get comfortable too. “So what do you do?”
“For a living?”
No, for kicks, nervous boy. “Yeah. What kind of work do you do?”
“I work nights. In security.”
“You’re a security guard? Well, you have the size for it, but that wouldn’t have been my first guess. You sound so well educated. I mean, who uses the word ravishing these days? Oh! Not that you couldn’t be extremely intelligent and still be a security guard. I didn’t mean to—”