Page 17 of Brooklynaire

“Oh my God.” I put my forehead into my palms and massage my brow bone, because my headache has just come roaring back to life. It’s bad enough that the earth beneath my feet has developed the awkward habit of tilting when I least expect it. Nate has just made me even more stressedout.

Not a half hour ago he convinced me that he wasn’t in a huge hurry to get me back to work. That the world won’t end if it takes more time to heal. So why the hell did he just drop fifty large on a doctor’sappointment?

Whodoesthat?

“Hey.” Nate’s voice grows soft, and he rises to stand behind my chair. A big hand lands on top of my head. “Becca. Everything is going to be okay. You know that,right?”

Nope. “It’s sort of hard to picture,” Iadmit.

The big hand slides down my hair, landing at my neck. Nate rubs the muscle at the base of my skull with strong fingers. It feels so freaking good that I let out an unladylike moan. Everythingtingles.

He chuckles, then adds his other hand and squeezes my shoulders. “You’re so tight.Jeez.”

I can’t even speak right now because it feels so good. It’s been a seriously long time since anyone touched me with kind hands. I’ve forgotten how good this feels. Nate just fed me, bribed a doctor to see me, and now he’s digging his thumbs into the achy spots at the back of myneck.

He’s takingcareof me. It’s so trippy. My job, more or less, is to take care of Nate’s hockey team. And sometimes Nate. So this turnabout is confusing. I don’t know what to think, and I can’t think anyway, since I have a head injury and his hands are turning me into a little blob of mindless goo. “Thank you,” I slur, my head heavy like a ragdoll’s.

Nate gives one last squeeze at the base of my skull. “Let me show you upstairs real quick. You need to know how everythingworks.”

I stand up slowly, which is a new habit of mine. I used to leap out of chairs and bound across rooms. Now I move around like mygranny.

Nate leads me back through the parlor, with its antique settees, back to the grand foyer, and up the stairway. The ornate bannister is carved from mahogany, and the marble steps beneath my feet are covered by an ornate carpetrunner.

I’ve never been upstairs before, but I’ve always beencurious.

We climb for a while because the ceilings are so high, especially for a home built before the Civil War. The staircase turns to the left. At the top, Nate leads me into an arched hallway, from which two doors open. “Down there is my room,” he says, pointing to the one at the end of the hall. “And you’ll stay inhere.”

I follow him into a big bedroom with a four-poster bed. “Wow, Nate. This looks like Her Royal Majesty’schambers.”

“Which RoyalMajesty?”

“The Queen of France. Duh.” Nate’s place is like the Met Museum after business hours. Big and empty. From the bedroom, I can see into the en-suite bathroom, which sports an enormous clawfoot bathtub. “This room iscrazy.”

“I don’t want to put you on the third floor. You shouldn’t be climbing too much if you’re unsteady. And this is a nice room. My parents stay here when theyvisit.”

I can climb stairs, I want to argue. But a half hour ago I nearly crashed in the tunnel at work. So I just sighinstead.

“Now let me show you the den. It’s my main living space, and you can make yourself at home.” I follow him back the way we came, past thestaircase.

We enter a room that’s long and low and paneled in oak. There’s a marble fireplace on one of the long walls. But it’s more comfortable than the fancy parlor downstairs. At one end of the room sits a pair of comfortable chairs beside an enormous, curved bay window. At the opposite end there’s a TV setup and an L-shaped couch. Several KTech reports are spread out on the coffeetable.

There are bookshelves lining the wall opposite the fireplace. They stretch from floor to ceiling, and there’s even one of those rolling ladder things that libraries on Pinterest have, for reaching the topshelves.

“Wow,” I say stupidly. Because how could Inot?

“This is my favorite room in thehouse.”

As soon as he speaks, a small screen blinks to life on the coffee table. “Hello, Nate,” says a disembodied voice. “Can I helpyou?”

“Not now, Hal,” Nateanswers.

“That was…?” Istop.

“Not a real person,” Nate says with a grin. “Hal…”

“Yes?” the machine asksimmediately.

“…Is the voice of a product I’m testing,” Nate says. “I’m trying to improve on the quality of smart speakers. They all suck, but Hal uses deep learning to quickly become moreconversant.”