Page 8

Three loud knocks sounded against the door as soon as I reached for the handle, only for me to back up when I glimpsed the slimy shine coating some of my fingers.

I hadn’t washed my hands after cleaning the chicken.

“Salmonella, Noah. Salmonella.” I hissed, jogging back to the sink. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”

Hurriedly, I used my elbow to pump soap into my other hand and waved my palm under our motion-activated faucet.

The woman knocked again as I tore two paper towels from the roll and dried my hands on the way back to the door.

Pulling it open, my arms shot out to catch her because she was tipping halfway over the threshold before I could blink. I’d snatched the door open at the same time she was about to knock for the third time.

“Where’d you come from?” I emptied the only question in my head after making sure she was steady on her feet.

The woman tugged at her towel, tucking it into itself so it would stay up around her body as she tried to catch her breath.

“Sir,” she panted, her eyes finally latching onto mine as I frowned down at her.

Bright, speckled pools of honey stared back at me. I held eye contact until she bent in half to grip her knees, still panting.

“You okay?”

“Shit, I’m out of shape,” she revealed on a miserable groan and my lips tipped up on their own. I wasn’t going to laugh, but this woman was hilarious without trying. The visual of her in this damn towel, suds sliding down the side of her shoulder and wheezing shouldn’t have been so entertaining.

“Sir.”Wheeze. “There’s a—”Wheeze. “Bat.”Wheeze.“In my…”Cough. “Shower.”

“You’re running from abat?”

She straightened to her full height, which was only a couple inches shorter than me and scowled. “It was in my shower. They carryrabies,” she pointed out hotly, her breath less shallow now.

“I see.”

The woman stood there, fuming and flustered while my eyes scanned her amber skin. When did we get a neighbor? And why didn’t I know she looked like this?

She had to be at least five-ten. I couldn’t see her hair, but from the way the shower cap was stretched, I could tell she had a pile of it. And the towel couldn’t hide that she was thick as?—

“Hel…lo!” She snapped her fingers between each syllable, snapping me back to the present moment.

When I blinked back into focus that scowl had turned into an adorable frown. Rubbing my hand over my brow, I attempted to get the conversation back on track. But she beat me to it, her exasperated huff filling the air between us.

“Can you please help me chase it out of my house?”

“You sure it’s still in there? The way you were running, I thought it was chasing you.”

Her lip twitched at that and so did her eye, and I had to bite back a smile.

I needed to stop fucking with this woman when she was in distress. My mother had raised me better than that. I would make sure she was ok,thenI would fuck with her.

Instead of looking at her, I glanced toward the back of the house, knowing the only other house on this street was a tiny cabin I never saw people go in.

The woman huffed again. “Fine. If you can’t help me, can I borrow your phone to call Animal Control? I’m not going back until I know it’s gone.”

“Animal Control?” I shook my head. “Nah, I got you. But you might wanna come in for a minute.”

She eyed me suspiciously as her frown deepened even more.

Throwing my hands up in surrender, I said, “Unless you want pneumonia…”

Last I checked, it was sixty-two degrees outside, and her being soaking wet under that towel wasn’t helping anything.