Page 72 of Levee

I didn’t flick on my lights, though, which meant the only lights on in the apartment were the one near my easel that I almost never turned off. And the one on the fish tanks.

“Oh, my God, guys,” I gasped, running over to grab the food and dropping an excessive amount into the water, watching as their tails swished as they pushed themselves up to the surface to eat. “I’m sorry,” I told them as they ate up everything I’d dropped. Guilt had me adding more, even if I knew it likely wouldn’t all get eaten and would mess with the pH of the water. I could deal with that later, when I knew their bellies were completely full.

I glanced around my darkened apartment, feeling like it was safer not to have any other lights on. It would look like a big sign telling the bad guys that I was home.

If they hadn’t seen me yet, I’d just rather they didn’t know I was back.

As I sat awake another night, I was starting to think crazy thoughts.

Like how and where someone might obtain a gun quickly.

I didn’t know the first thing about gun laws in Florida. I didn’t even know anything about them in my home state. It was just something that had never been on my mind, I guess. I always felt… relatively safe. Sure, there’d been times when I was feeling followed at night, or when there was a strange sound outside of my home, that kind of thing. But never this bone-deep fear based not on wildly unlikely scenarios I came up with in my head, but actual events.

I was relatively sure it was on the easy side to get a gun down here. But would there be a waiting period? If there was, what were the less than legal channels for getting a weapon?

That wasn’t exactly something you could, you know, look up online. And I didn’t want Lily and Curtis to worry about me if I asked.

Maybe I could ask the kid who saved me if I saw him around again. I had a feeling that kids who carried around switchbladeswould know a thing or two about this sort of situation. Even if it still felt icky to ask a literal child that sort of question.

In the end, I got through the night. And as soon as the sun started to stream through the windows, I went back to my easel, working the day away on the canvas for Zayn.

Things always felt better in the light.

But, inevitably, night would come. And so would the restless, nightmare-ridden sleep, the fears that had my throat feeling like it was restricting, that had me jumping at shadows and cowering away from strange noises.

I was half ready to pack up my car and drive all the way back to my hometown when my phone chimed for a text.

I would lie and say I’m coming to see my uncle and was going to drop in to say hi. But I actually just want to come see you. You game?

Was accepting his offer just a way of escaping my reality again?

Yes, absolutely.

But I wasn’t going to overthink it.

He wanted to be here.

I wanted that too.

It could be that easy.

I just prayed it didn’t mean I would now be putting him in danger too.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Levee

I actually had to hold myself back from speeding the whole fucking way to Jade’s place.

Yeah, that was how far gone I was with this woman already.

I’d been up since almost dawn, trying to decide when a decent hour to text her without sounding too needy was.

As I pulled up outside of my old apartment building, I had a storage compartment in my bike full of condoms and four of them shoved in my pockets to get started.

But, oddly, it wasn’t sex that was on my mind as I spotted Jade outside of the building holding two reusable grocery bags and talking to a group of teens.

I just… wanted to spend time with her. Hear her talk. Watch her face brighten up when she smiled. Feel her legs draped over mine. Smell her signature lavender scent.

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