Page 9

“Just giving you shit, Mags.” He lightly shoved her knee. “I’m always up for a burger.”

Climbing off the sofa, she smiled and scooped up his empty mug and headed for the door. “I’ll meet you around five, then.”

“Sounds”—Harry yawned—“good.” He got up and headed toward his bed in the back of the room. It was covered in a tangled mess of sheets. “Goin’ back to sleep. Thanks for the coffee.”

“You’re the only person I know who can drink that much caffeine and then go right back to sleep.” She paused. “To be fair, I don’t really know that many people.”

He laughed as he flopped onto his stomach on his bed.

“See you later, lazy bastard.” Leaving his apartment, she shut the door behind her. He didn’t ever bother to leave his door locked. He was built like a linebacker, and he could crush anybody stupid enough to cross him. She knew that from experience.

Homes for the mentally unstable weren’t exactly the safest places for a young girl living on her own. There was more than one reason she considered Harry a good friend. At least that memory was one that she knew was real.

The man kicked her door in. She hadn’t closed it in time. It cracked into her face and sent her sprawling to the ground. The man laughed, wiping the drool from his lip. He lived in 9A. That was literally all she knew about him. She tried to keep her distance from the other people who lived in the slum-hole that people like her had to rent.

It was a place with staff and security.

Kind of.

The fat fuck of a security guard was always just sitting at the front desk watching cartoons on his phone. This was the kind of place that was supposed to be equipped to handle troubled people.

Kind of.

If you called “equipped” a single phone on the first floor that called the local urgent care. This was the kind of place that was supposed to be safe.

Kind of.

The man shoved his hand down his dirty, stained sweatpants and started fondling himself.

Safe. Sure. Right. Grimacing in disgust, she shot back up to her feet, ignoring the burning on her cheek from where the edge of the door had clocked her. She was going to have a shiner. “Get the fuck out!”

He reached for her with his other hand.

That was all the motivation she needed. Picking up the lamp from her end table, she smashed it against his head. The shade fell to the ground, crumpled, but the base was still usable. The man from 9A staggered. She hit him again. He fell to the ground.

She didn’t stop hitting him.

Again. And again.

And again.

Powerless. That was what she was. That was what she always was. Powerless and weak. Powerless and little. Something to be used. A poker chip. A pawn.

No more. She didn’t fall from the balcony. She jumped. This was about her. Not him. She was done being used!

A hand grabbed her wrist before she could slam the lamp base into the man’s head one more time. In wild-eyed panic, she went to punch whoever it was who had grabbed her.

“Hey! Hey—calm down, holy shit.” The man laughed, ducking her swing. “Hey. You’re okay. He’s out. Really out.”

The man standing next to her was tall, broad-shouldered, and muscular. He had an easy smile, marred only by the stubble of a five o’clock shadow that had turned into a ten o’clock shadow.

He glanced down at the guy. “Uh…is he dead? Fuck, girl.”

9A was bleeding from a gash on his head. His eyes were open but weren’t focusing on anything. He was breathing. Honestly, she didn’t know what she had done to him, and she really didn’t want to find out. But she had straight-up assaulted a man.

Harry knelt and pressed his fingers to the man’s throat. “He’s alive.”

That was almost somehow worse. Alive meant he could press charges. Panic started to well in her chest again, but for a very different reason. “Oh, no. Oh, no. I’m going to get arrested, and they’re going to—”