“Useful tip. I’ll be sure to keep it in mind.”
“Hey!” A man’s booming voice came from above. “Jack? You okay in there?”
“We’re fine,” Jack called back. To Riley he said, “That’s Tony, one of my police buddies.”
“Pretty sure your whole building just lost power,” Tony reported. “If the elevator’s not moving, I guess there’s no backup generator. Want me to call the fire department?”
Jack darted a glance in Riley’s direction, as if assessing her panic level. She gave him a weak smile.
“The fire department can get us out,” he told her, “but this would be a low-priority call for them. Depending on what other outages or accidents have been caused by the storm, we may have to wait a little bit.”
“Understandable.” She mentally crossed her fingers that the power would kick back on any second now.
While Jack continued his conversation through the ceiling, she sat down, her back to the wall and her denim-clad legs stretched out in front of her. There was a lid on the old printer paper box she’d been carrying, and luckily none of her paperwork had spilled.
After Tony returned to Jack’s apartment, her new neighbor sat across from her, flashing a grin that brightened the darkness even more than her phone. “Since we’re crisis buddies, don’t you think I should know your name?”
“I’m Riley. Riley Kendrick.” The other people in the building probably just called her The Hermit in 4-C.
“Nice to meet you. Officially.”
Her cheeks heated as she recalled their last encounter. She turned off her phone’s screen to preserve the battery. If shutting down the phone also kept Jack from seeing her blush, well...that was a bonus.
“I apologize for the way I overreacted the other night,” she said. “Rainstorms make me jumpy.” Rainstorms, the dark, the sound of pipes settling, her own shadow. She’d spooked herself a few weeks ago when she’d caught movement from the corner of her eye. Her heart rate had tripled before she realized it was her reflection in the mirrored closet door.
If she did go to the tenant Halloween party in a couple of weeks, at least she knew what her costume should be—the Cowardly Lion. A frustrated noise caught in her throat, not quite a growl, but damn close.
“Riley?” Jack’s voice was rich with humor. “Please tell me that was you. Otherwise, we may be sharing the elevator with something not human.”
“Just me, snarling in exasperation.”
“About the power outage stalling you? Were you in a hurry to get somewhere?”
“Actually, I was headed to see my accountant.”
“On a Saturday evening?”
“Well. He’s also my brother-in-law.” The middle Kendrick sister, Rochelle, was the only one married. She’d met her husband while they were both getting their MBAs.
Rochelle had once said that, of the three sisters, Riley was the perfect blend of traits. “Wren’s paintings are fabulous, when she bothers to finish them, but she’s flighty as hell. I have a brain like a calculator, but no imagination. With your web design, you balance creativity and content management. Plus, you’re braver than Wren and me put together.”
Before, maybe.
She sighed, letting her head fall back against the wall. “I’m not exasperated because I’m running late. I’m exasperated with myself.” For all that she wouldn’t have chosen to be in the dark, not being able to see more than Jack’s basic outline was liberating. It was easier to be candid when you didn’t have to meet a person’s gaze. “I’ve become quite the scaredy-cat lately.”
“Don’t beat yourself up over your little scream earlier. Most people would be alarmed by their elevator taking a sudden dip then stopping dead.”
Her lips tugged in a reluctant smile. “Shouldn’t the first rule between crisis buddies be not using words like dead?”
“Good point.”
A moment passed, and she admitted, “It’s not just the elevator falling that made me jumpy. Or even you coming around the corner the other night. A year ago, before I moved here, I... Sorry. I don’t normally treat neighbors like therapists.”
There was a rustle of movement, and she could tell he was sitting straighter, his demeanor alert. “Like I have anything else occupying my time right now? Besides, I’m a good listener. Coaxing details from people is a big part of my job.”
She had no intention of reliving the gritty details, but maybe reaching a point where she could calmly summarize what had happened was part of healing. “The short version is, I was supposed to go away for a long weekend with my sisters but turned back because of weather delays. Unfortunately, I walked into my house midburglary. I wasn’t really hurt,” she said in a rush, trying not to imagine all the ways it could have been worse, “but it left me...shaken.”
“Of course it did.” His voice was soft and sympathetic.
Had she given another person reason to see her as a victim? She hated the worry that lined her parents’ faces whenever they looked at her. “I’m totally fine,” she said, playing fast and loose with the definition of fine. “I just miss the old me. Do you have any siblings?”
“Nope.”
“I’m the oldest of three sisters, and growing up, everyone called me the daring one. Or, if they were feeling less charitable, the troublemaker. Now I don’t even have the backbone to cross a parking lot without imagining the bogeyman, or to stand up to the president of the tenant board.”
“That would be Mrs. Tyler?” His tone was the vocal equivalent of a shudder. “I met her. She may actually be the bogeyman.”
“Yeah, she does put the ty in tyrant.” Over the summer, it had crossed Riley’s mind that she might feel safer if she bought a dog, even just a small one; since she worked at home, it wasn’t as though it would be cooped up alone all day. When she’d petitioned the three-member board about getting a pet, as per building policy, Anna Tyler had reacted with the same civic outrage as if Riley had proposed starting a meth lab.
But Riley’s problem was a lot bigger than an unpleasant tenant board president. “I want to feel like myself again. I want to do something spontaneous, maybe even reckless! Like...” She cast about for an example, trying to remember the carefree way she’d once looked at life. “Like jump naked into the pool!”
His sharp intake of breath reverberated in the stillness.
What am I doing? Her new neighbor was more than a self-proclaimed good listener, he was also a very attractive and virile man. Mention of getting naked could lead to some awkward hallway encounters. “I don’t know why I said that.”
“It was a spontaneous declaration. So, good on you.”
She tried to amuse herself by imagining the scandalized expression on Mrs. Tyler’s face if tenants took to skinny-dipping. But it was impossible to picture the well-coiffed dictator’s outrage when Riley’s mind was focused on the man in the elevator, mere feet from her. The dark, which had seemed confessional in an anonymous and cozy sort of way, was beginning to foster an illusion of intimacy. Riley hadn’t dated much in the last year, despite her mother’s efforts. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d felt this pull of connection to a man.
“I’ve been skinny-dipping,” Jack volunteered.
The uncooperative imagination that hadn’t wanted to supply a picture of Mrs. Tyler looking appalled was perfectly happy to speculate on Jack Reed in his full glory. Though