The next month was glorious.
I woke up every morning to bustling traffic and pedestrians darting back and forth on the streets below. The view took my breath away, and it never stopped. And it was quiet. That had been my only concern, having a resident below and above me, but I shouldn’t have worried at all. I heard nothing to even indicate that I had neighbors.
However, I’d seen one a couple times when I went to the gym. She looked to be in her early thirties, and as soon as I entered to hit the treadmill, she grabbed her towel and bottle of water and left. I thought it was me, but the fourth time I arrived, she was just starting, and she stayed the whole hour. I saw her a few other times after that, but she kept her head down and focused on her workout until she left.
In a way, it was a nice break from all the attention I’d received after Liam’s death. So many people had approached me to express their condolences. I knew very few of them. They were the stranger neighbors or Liam’s coworkers. I hadn’t realized how exhausting it had been—the smiles, the warm wishes back to each of them, all people I didn’t know. This woman was frank. She didn’t know me. She didn’t care to know me. I rather liked it.
Once I realized that Monday, Wednesday, and Friday she went to the gym at eleven in the morning, and her Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday schedule was five in the afternoon, I adjusted my routine and went at a different time. Since then we’d passed once in the lobby. I was leaving the elevator, and she was getting on. She gave me her first smile, and I grinned back.
I felt like she was thanking me for leaving her alone.
I didn’t meet another resident until my fifth week living here. I’d started a routine where I grabbed the mail as soon as it came, which was around eleven in the morning. I went to the pool area to open it with a cup of coffee. After that, I’d either go upstairs to read a book, or I’d work out. It depended on whether not-so-friendly neighbor was using the gym or not. In addition to the normal television and movies I watched, I became a CNN addict. There was a restlessness in me, like life was passing me by, and I didn’t want to miss a thing.
Yet when I thought about finding a job or writing a piece, emotions surged up in me. I didn’t want to feel those emotions; I didn’t even want to name them. I just didn’t want them, so I’d go back to doing something that numbed me. Anything.
But everything was different in the mornings. It was a fresh start. Those feelings were pushed all the way down, and this morning was the same. I felt somewhat cheerful as I opened a letter from my realtor. My house was still being shown. I figured. Anything pressing would warrant a phone call or an email.
Then a man entered the pool area behind me.
I glanced up, startled by his presence, and my elbow hit my coffee. “Oh, no.” I bent quickly to snatch it up.
“Here.” The guy came over, grabbing a handful of towels on the way. He knelt, blotting the coffee to absorb it. “Sorry about that,” he said as he looked up.
Young. Tall. And when he looked up at me, close—personal bubble close. He was pretty, or that was how Sia would’ve described him. Tall, dark, and handsome. The cliché fit him perfectly. His body was lean, and judging from the swim trunks and white shirt, swimming was the way he kept himself in shape. He wasn’t gorgeous like the guy from the restaurant. Yes, I am still thinking about him. He didn’t have the same striking, intense eyes or physique. This guy had a rounder face. He was more filled out, but he was still good-looking, and he was waiting for my response.
I shook my head. “That was my fault.” I frowned at the dirtied towels. “Is that okay? Do I need to let Dorian know it was my fault? They’re stained.”
He glanced down as if he didn’t know what I was talking about. Seeing the towels, his shoulders shook with laughter. “No. The money this place gets, they can afford a few stained towels. These will get tossed anyway.” He dropped them on a nearby table and held his hand out to me. “I’m Jake Parker. I’m on the seventh floor. You’re the new resident, right?”
I shook his hand. “I am. Third floor. I’m Addison—” I was about to say my married name, but heard myself saying instead, “—Bowman.” I’d told him my maiden name. Why did I do that—nope. I wasn’t going to analyze it. It was done.
“Addison Bowman?” He pulled out the chair across from me. “Do you mind?”
“No. Please, sit.”
He sat down, and I straightened up. It felt weird to be sitting with another man, even though he was a neighbor.
“You okay?” His voice was soft and concerned. He hunched forward, so he didn’t appear so tall. His eyes looked into mine, and they were warm, like heated chocolate. “I can go, if I’m making you uncomfortable.”
“No.” I shook my head, holding a hand out. “Please stay. I mean it.”
“You sure?”
“I am.”
“Good.” He relaxed in his seat, kicking out one of his legs. He didn’t touch me, but six inches to the right and his leg would’ve been pressed right against mine.
“I’m a lawyer. My firm’s a couple blocks down.” A grin tugged at his lips. “Most of the partners have their own places outside the city, but I’m a workaholic. Figured it was better to be closer to work.”
“You’re a new partner?”
He nodded. “Two months. It paid to be there all the time.” Pride filled his voice. “How about you? What do you do?”
“Uh…” I looked at the table, for just a moment. “I’m a freelance writer. I used to do a column.”
“Used to?”
“I’ve taken some time off.”
“Breaks are good.” He lightened his tone, glancing around and frowning at the pool. “I’ve been in New York for work the last few weeks, and I’ve neglected working out.” His gaze swung back to mine. His eyes narrowed. “I’m surprised I haven’t run into you before now. When’d you move in?”
“Five weeks ago.”
His head bobbed up and down. “Oh yeah, and I’m sure you were probably busying unpacking and everything.”
I nodded, gesturing out the door to the gym on the other side of the hallway. “I saw another woman in there a few times.”
His grin widened. “Let me guess, she took off as soon as you walked in? And kept doing it, making you think you have a disease or something?”
“She did that to you, too?”
“Oh, yeah.” He rolled his eyes and began drumming his fingers on the table. “That’s Dawn, but that’s just how she is. She has to warm up to people. Gotta say, this place is perfect for her. Not many residents here. It’s exclusive, safe, and she’s protected. The first couple months I was here, that’s how she was. Then it switched. She started smiling, talking, and now we’ve hung out a couple times. There are a few of us who do dinners together. Dawn’s hosting the next one. I can ask her if you can come, but I’d be surprised if she okayed that. I’m doing the one after that. You should come to that one for sure. It’s next month. I’ve got a mean slow cooker, just to let you know.” He blew on his knuckles. “I’m known around these parts as Chef Slow Pot.”
A laugh burst out of me. “Thank you for that, Chef Slow Pot.”
“Mmm-hmmm. Ninja skills in the kitchen. I’m telling you.” He winked. “But seriously, don’t worry about Dawn. She’ll warm up to you, and you’ll find her buzzing your door with coffee every morning.”
I lifted an eyebrow. “She does that for you, huh?”
“No. She’ll do that for you.” He gestured to my empty cup on the table between us. “She tends to show up with wine at my place, when I’m home. Because of her thing with people, she sticks like glue to the ones she knows. I’m the wine-and-movie friend. Half the time she zonks out and sleeps on the couch.”
“You two are good friends?”
“I guess so. She’s fun. Wicked obsessed with The Walking Dead.” He leaned forward to rest his elbows on the table. “I know Dawn and I are single. How about you? There’s a couple on the fifth floor, and the only other resident I’ve met is Derek. He’s an IT guy, so if you’ve got computer problems, he’s below me on the sixth floor.”
“What floor is Dawn?”
“Second. I don’t know who’s on the fourth floor.” He pointed to the ceiling. “And the big boss, too. I’ve not met him.”
My mind was spinning, doing the math. “So there’s you on seven, IT guy on six, a couple on five, four is a question mark, I’m three, and Dawn’s on two. Who’s the big boss? He’s not on four?”
“No way. I’m sorry. I meant the owner. He’s got the top three floors in here.”
There were those three black buttons in the elevator. “Who’s the owner?”
“Who knows.” His shoulders lifted and dropped back down. He pushed his chair up to rest on the back two legs. He kept hold of the table. “That’s the big mystery. No one knows who owns the place. We all go through Dorian for everything.”
“Why the secrecy?”
He shook his head again. “You got me. I know Dawn’s obsessed with figuring it out. She’s a hermit in terms of the outside world, but she tries to stake out the elevator. Dorian or Kenneth always kicks her out. Technically, we can do whatever we want around here. That’s their whole motto—that this building is our home—but you noticed there’s nothing in the lobby, right?”
“I did. Yeah.”
“That’s because of Dawn. There used to be a couple couches down there, but she took them up as her favorite knitting spot. She’d sit there for an entire day and all night a couple times, knitting her blankets and listening to books on tape. I thought it was hilarious. She texted me to bring her food and relieve her so she could go to the bathroom.”
“And during that, still no sign of him?”
“Nope. Not a glimpse. I don’t think he’s here that often, if it is a he. Who knows. Maybe it’s a woman. I think he or she—” He winked at me. “—was here last month sometime. The shipping elevators were shut down.”
“When you weren’t here?”
“Dawn told me. She orders stuff a lot. She had a table coming that day and was super steamed because Dorian made her move the arrival date back. I was on the phone with her for three hours.”
“Sounds entertaining.”
He glanced back over his shoulder, eyeing the pool again. “I suppose.” A deep sigh. “I have to meet clients tonight. I should get to my workout.” He stood up, pushing his chair back in place. “It was nice to meet you, Addison.”
“You, too.” My stomach dipped as he said my name, his eyes lingering on my lips. “Jake.”
“Yes. Jake. That’s my name.” He pointed to me, winking again. “Keep using it, and if you’re not here when I finish, I mean it about the dinner next month. I’ll drop an invite in your mailbox.”
“Sounds perfect.” Sia. “Wait.”
He turned.
“Can I bring a friend?”
The corners of his mouth turned down, but smoothed out right away. He smiled. “Of course.”
“You might regret saying that. I’ll bring my best friend. She’s…a handful, I’ll just say.”
His grin widened. “Perfect. Dawn will freak if there’s a stranger, so we’ll have a good show. She’ll come back down once you’re gone. She’s already claimed a TWD marathon that night. Anyway, sounds good. I look forward to meeting this friend of yours.”
He lingered, staring another moment before he pulled his gaze away and went to the pool. I still had more mail to open, but I checked my phone. The clock agreed with me. Grabbing my mail, I went to the front lobby. There was a back elevator, and I wasn’t sure about the special codes. I’d stood at it one day and kept hitting the button. Nothing happened. So since then, I’d always gone to the front elevator.
Pushing through the door that connected the rest of the first floor with the front lobby, I stopped abruptly when I saw Dorian talking to Ken. Both wore similar grim expressions, but when they heard the door open, welcoming smiles instantly took their place.
“Ms. Bowman.” Dorian approached, his hand stretched out toward the elevator. “May I ride up with you?”
I nodded as the doors slid open, and he stepped inside, holding them for me. I glanced to Ken and saw some of the seriousness had returned to his face. He didn’t catch my look, but Dorian did. He cleared his throat, saying pointedly, “I’ll be right back, Kenneth.”
Ken looked up and saw my scrutiny. His warm and welcoming smile returned as he nodded. “Of course, Mr. Dorian. Ms. Bowm—”
“Addison.”
“Hmm?” He was half-turned back toward his office.
“Use my first name, Ken.” I added quietly, “Please.”
“Oh. Yes.” He chuckled softly. “I certainly will from now on.”
Stepping inside the elevator, I swung a stern look toward Dorian. “That goes for you, too.”
His head lowered slightly. “I will, Addison.” He hit the third button.
After that, we rode in silence, and when I stepped out on my floor, I glanced over my shoulder.
Dorian hit one of the black buttons.