Page 25 of Houston, We Have a Problem
I gulp. There had better not be actual skeletons in his closet. One of the podcasts I listened to on the drive to New Mexico involved a lady who saved the bones of all her victims and put them on wire, like creepy giant stop motion dolls. I stopped listening before I found out if she ever did make stop motion movies with them and instead switched to Disney music for the rest of the drive.
“Come over anytime you need to do laundry,” he tells me and places the key in my palm, his fingers lingering there and sending chills through me. “Jesse too.”
I curl my fingers around the key, telling myself that I can only use this for laundry. Not for snooping. I don’t know why Houston is trusting me so easily, but I don’t want to use it against him. “Yeah, no, Jesse is exceptionally particular about his clothes and has to have them professionally cleaned. It’s a whole production.”
Houston chuckles, taking a step forward into my space. This feels all too familiar, but his intent is the complete opposite from what he did in the training room. He doesn’t want me gone like he did Tamlin; he wants to cut the space between us to nothing. “Jesse seems like an interesting guy.”
The step I take back is more painful than I want to admit, and I feel it in every microsecond of Houston’s disappointment. He’s so good at schooling his features to hide what he’s really feeling, but it’s my job to see past the front. What did I do to make him start falling for me like this? We’ve barely interacted, and all I did was come over to do laundry.
“I should go,” I say, wishing I didn’t have to.
He nods once and leads me to the door, opening it for me. “If you change your mind about tonight, we’ll be at Grey Bird Tavern at eight. They really do have the best nachos.”
My smile is real, but it drops the second I close my front door once I’m inside my side of the duplex. I’ve got my phone in hand, dialing Connor even though I probably shouldn’t be calling him in panic mode like this.
Thankfully, he answers, and he only gets halfway through his greeting before I say, “Houston almost kissed me.”
Silence fills the distance between us for nearly ten seconds—seconds that I spend thinking about the way Houston held my hand so timidly—before Connor’s voice pulls me back. “Darcy you or Tamlin you?”
The question is so ludicrous that it instantly calms my racing heart. “Are you serious? He hates Tamlin.”
“Just checking. What was the circumstance? I thought you weren’t going to flirt with him.”
“I wasn’t! I didn’t. I just went over to do laundry, and we got to talking. And then bam! He’s going in for a kiss.” Granted, I did take his hand, but it’s not like that’s some big gesture of romance. Old ladies hold people’s hands all the time. Fathers with their daughters. Random strangers when they meet.
Okay, a handshake is not the same thing, but still.
Connor makes a thoughtful sound, his chair squeaking in the background as he spins from side to side. I’m not sure why he’s still at the office, but I’m glad he picked up. “Well, Briggs does have a reputation.”
“He has a reputation for being in monogamous relationships,” I argue. “Not for casual flings with his tenants.” It’s why I decided after I moved in that I should stick with the friendship route, something I told Connor earlier this week. It seemed more likely to get me something.
“There’s a lot we don’t know about him. That’s why you’re there, Darcy. I can’t shake this feeling that there’s some sort of story with this guy, good or bad, and I know you can find it. It’s just the matter ofhow.”
I groan, pacing the living room as I work through this. “I really don’t think he was hoping for an easy score, Connor. It’s not his MO, for one, but it also seems like he’s actually…” Like he’s interested. Inme. Which is ridiculous.
Connor hums again. “You must have sent him signals, so what’s your level of involvement here? Again, you said you weren’t going to flirt with him as Darcy, but it seems like maybe you did.”
Did I? I would say I don’t know how to flirt, but I’ve done plenty of flirting as Tamlin. The makeup and the outfits help, but it’s still me saying the words and making the moves. It’s not like I’ve done it a lot—mostly just to hone in on an athlete’s baser nature if that’s where the story’s going—but I guess it’s possible that I was accidentally flirting with Houston.
Or subconsciously. The man is gorgeous, athletic, and quite possibly the most interesting person I’ve ever met. The more I learn, the more I want to know.
“Maybe I flirted,” I admit. “Tell me what to do, Connor. I shouldn’t push this, right?”
He squeaks in his chair a few times, adding in some pen clicking this time. I don’t know how that doesn’t drive him crazy, but it helps him think. “You probably need to pump the brakes for a bit. You’ve got Houston on a line, but you don’t want to reel him in too quickly. We need to make sure he’s good and caught before we grab the net.”
I purse my lips. “You’ve never been fishing before, have you?”
“Not once. Just go with it. Do some friendzoning and see what he does with it. I’d rather you stay safe, and there’s a lot you can learn just by observing. He’s hiding something; we just have to figure out what it is.”
I can friendzone; it’s my comfort zone and exactly the place I’ve spent most of my life. But I’m starting to feel weirdabout digging this deep into afeeling. What is Connor looking for? “And in the meantime?”
“In the meantime, try to work out another encounter with Tamlin. Figure out somewhere public that he’ll be and let him see you. If he starts getting paranoid, we’ll know he’s got something worth looking for, and then we can use Darcy to figure it out.”
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re a little scary sometimes?”
Connor laughs, and the sound is oddly comforting. I know he’s got my back, which really helps this whole thing feel less sketchy. He clearly recognizes that I’m uncomfortable with how things are playing out, even if he doesn’t know the reason, and he’s doing his best to make things work for both of us. He has a job to do, just like I do.
“Now we just have to figure out a place for the two of you to bump into each other,” he says.
