Page 11 of Roommate Wars
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“Morning,”I said as I entered the kitchen the next day. “Thank you for the blanket.” I’d left my door open a crack last night, and Jack must have given me one at some point.
He was sitting at the counter scarfing cereal and scrolling through his phone. “No worries,” he said without looking up.
I opened the pantry. “Do you know what happened to my purse? I couldn’t find it last night.”
After I nodded off yesterday afternoon, I’d slept straight through the night. Living in the roach and mold apartment was stressful, but damn, that was a lot of sleep.
He crunched on a mouthful of some kind of granola/cornflake combo and said, “It’s gone.”
I blinked several times, and my heart began to pound. “Gone? My purse has my work access card and phone, along with my credit cards. It can’t be gone.”
For a second he stopped chewing, his gaze darting to the side. Then he proceeded to shove another bite in his mouth. “It’s getting fumigated by a guy who knows a guy that Max put me in touch with.”
My eyes widened. “What? Jackson, you can’t just take my stuff.”
“Name’s not Jackson, just Jack.” He glanced up, finally looking at me. “Don’t they know you at the health department? Will they need to see the badge to let you in?”
There was probably someone I could call, though it wouldn’t look good to have lost my badge right after starting the job. “That’s beside the point. You can’t take my things and do what you want with them. Those were my personal belongings! My purse has my driver’s license and phone and money.”
He gulped orange juice, his muscular throat working the liquid down, and I glanced away. There was a reason I’d had a crush on Sophia’s old roommate—and it was because he was hot as hell. Even his throat, damn him. I was furious, but my hormones had a mind of their own.
He set the glass on the marble countertop. “Driver’s license? You don’t own a car; you take the bus to work.”
How the hell did he know that?
I threw up my hands. “I need my money. And I have no clothes!” I was still wearing the boxers and T-shirt he’d lent me yesterday.
He finally took me in, and his gaze snagged on my legs before he lifted the bowl to his mouth and drank the cereal milk like a savage.
“Jackson, are you listening?”
He cut me a glare. “Are you going to keep calling me that?”
Finally, something I said got his attention. “Yes. It’s catchy.”
“You’ll never get your purse back with that attitude.”
I breathed in and counted to ten, then let out the air. I would kill him after I got my purse back, but not before. “I can’t go to work looking like this. I have a professional job.”
He stood and carried his dish to the sink, where he rinsed it under the water. “Borrow more of my stuff. I’m sure you can do something with one of my button-down shirts.”
Okay, that could work. “What about pants?”
“Your sister is on her way down. Borrow a pair of hers.”
“What?”
Right on cue, my sister stormed into the apartment, carrying her giant, all-purpose bag, her hair already frizzy even though it was only seven thirty in the morning. “Where have you been?” Her face was flushed, her expression concerned.
He’d called Sophia? Jack was dead.
And if he thought I’d stop calling him that ridiculous nickname, he had another thing coming. This was a trap. He’d brought me here to torture me with my sister’s overprotectiveness, and it was about to backfire on his ass.
I smiled reassuringly at Soph. “I was a little busy. Sorry for not getting in touch sooner.”
Sophia dumped her bag on the counter, and it landed with a thud that sounded like she might have broken her laptop. “You couldn’t return a phone call?”
