She didn’t appear to notice. She was too busy shuffling down the hall, dodging empty bottles of water lined up like bowling skittles and what seemed to be countless Amazon Prime delivery boxes. He picked his way through the chaos and followed her into an equally disordered living room, where fancy furniture was covered with pillows, books, empty mugs, and video-game cases that said PS4 on the front.
Oh, and then there was the cat.
It lay stretched across the glass coffee table, surrounded by a rainbow of prescription medication. Chloe picked up the boxes of pills, ignored the cat, and asked, “Happy?”
He stared. “The cat’s right there.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She hesitated, then took a nervous little breath. He wondered if she was about to confess to murder. Instead, she said, “I don’t suppose you’d make some tea? Lavender for me, please.”
He stared. Had she just—? Did she really think he would—? Well, holy fuck. The balls on this woman. “Used to servants, are you?”
“Oh, yes,” she said.
It took him three solid seconds and one aborted scowl to realize that she was joking. Chloe Brown had just made yet another joke in that deadpan, oddly self-deprecating way of hers, which she really had to stop doing because he was starting to enjoy it.
She turned to leave the room while he questioned his grip on reality. “If you hear any ominous bangs,” she called, “knock. If I don’t respond, you can rush in to my rescue.”
“… Knock?” he echoed blankly.
“On the bathroom door,” she told him, as if he was being particularly thick. “I’ve decided to use your presence as supervision.”
“Super—?” Too late. She’d disappeared, mountain of medication in hand. “All right then,” Red said to the empty living room.
The cat miaowed.
“Shut it, you. If she’s hurt herself, you’re to blame.”
The cat was blatantly unrepentant.
Red went to make the tea.
The kitchen was comparatively tidy and reasonably clean. It had a few additions to the standard outfit, too: most notably a dishwasher, sleek and quietly efficient, which he had not authorized. She also had a plush little seat, the kind found at fancy bars, placed randomly by the oven. Odd. She had countless different flavors of tea, plus some PG Tips—thank Christ—all in the usual place. No milk in the fridge, but there was an army of juice cartons in there, plus a ton of stacked-up Tupperware boxes. Those boxes were filled with salad, chicken, tuna, sliced cheese, and more. Like a little pre-chopped buffet.
Someone was looking after her. Or she did all this herself because she was proper anal. Red looked out at her tornado of a living room and decided that the first option seemed more likely. Now, why would someone look after Chloe Brown? Maybe she was a spoiled brat. Maybe she needed the help sometimes. Maybe he should mind his own business and make the fucking tea.
He made it, helped himself to the biscuit tin as payment, enjoyed what appeared to be a homemade gingersnap, and grabbed a couple more. In the living room, he spotted empty packets of fancy chocolate among all the rubble. If he was going to bring Chloe Brown food, which he would never do, he’d bring something sweet. She seemed like a sweet sort of woman.
And he seemed like he’d lost his mind.
He made space for the tea on the table, between rubbish and cats, and perched on the sofa beside a PlayStation controller and a spray of shiny business cards. The cat didn’t seem particularly interested in the tea, but Red kept half an eye out even as he studied the cards.
SUBLIME DESIGN ONLINE
WEB DESIGN, SEO, SOCIAL MEDIA BRANDING, AND MORE
Chloe’s details were on the back.
Huh. Fancy that. He needed a website; apparently, she made them. Not that he’d ever hire her. Ideally, he’d prefer a web designer he didn’t want to strangle.
“Nosy, nosy, nosy,” Chloe said.
He looked up to find her leaning against the doorway, not in a casually charming sort of way, but in a can’t-stand-up-straight sort of way. He leaped to his feet. “Are you all right?”
“Absolutely. Are you eating my biscuits?”
He shoved the last one in his mouth and mumbled, “Nah.”
“I saw you.”
“I see the cat.”
“Point taken.” Her walk toward him was slow and painful to watch. She moved like someone who’d taken a beating. If he hadn’t helped her safely down that tree himself, he’d assume she’d fallen. She was wearing her glasses now, at least, along with an enormous pink dressing gown and a pair of equally enormous bunny-ear slippers. The slippers surprised him until he remembered that Chloe used cuteness to disguise her inner evil. Sort of like Professor Umbridge.
Except he couldn’t imagine Professor Umbridge saving a cat from a tree. Never mind. He’d think about that later.
Her eyes seemed a little too bright and unfocused. Her hair was down, floating around her face in fluffy waves that reminded him of thunder clouds. She patted at it self-consciously with hands that … shook? For fuck’s sake. He barely resisted the urge to pick her up and carry her off to bed. Didn’t want her to take it the wrong way. He also didn’t want to care about her problems, but he knew himself well enough to realize that he’d care for a great white shark if given half the chance. He helped. Always. He just couldn’t help himself.
“You shouldn’t barge into people’s homes,” she said, “if you can’t cope with a minor state of undress.”
He sat down, realizing that he’d been staring. She seemed embarrassed by the scrutiny. “Sorry. I’m fine. I’m an intrepid home barger. Don’t worry about me.”
“I wasn’t.” She collapsed onto the mammoth sofa like a sack of potatoes, surrounding him with a cloud of soft, floral scent. “Give me the tea, would you?”
He gave her the tea. She cradled it like a baby and sipped with obvious relief. He watched her as closely as he could, which was pretty fucking close. And Red noticed things. Like the faint V between her eyebrows, the grimace she couldn’t quite fight. The moisture that gleamed on her throat and collarbone, maybe left over from the shower, as if she hadn’t dried off fully. The bare curve of her calves, visible beneath the hem of her dressing gown. That last part wasn’t relevant to his suspicions, so he didn’t know why his mind got stuck on it. Whatever.
Finally, he asked, “Are you going to admit that you’re hurt?”
“I am not hurt,” she said, “I am in pain.” Her voice was bright in a dangerous sort of way, like a knife flashing in the sunlight. Like she was ten seconds and one irritating question away from skewering him.
He used his most patient, judgment-free tone. “Difference being … ?”
“I’m always in pain, Mr. Morgan. Especially when I do ridiculous things like climb trees for ungrateful cats.”
“Red,” he corrected absently, while puzzle pieces slotted together in his mind. “Chronic pain?”
She looked up at him, clearly surprised.
“What? I know things.”
Her eye roll could only be described as epic. “How wonderful for you.”
That, apparently, was the end of that. She didn’t seem inclined to explain further, and if she wasn’t hiding some urgent injury, the whole thing was none of his business. He told himself that very firmly: None of my business. None of my business. None of my fucking business. She’d have people to call when she needed them, the way his mum called him when she fucked up her insulin. There was no reason for him to hang around any longer.