A Perfect Pair

The abrupt, angry sound pierced the silence in which Nate had been sitting at the kitchen table, spooning up Cheerios. He jumped slightly and a few Cheerios dripped onto his lap. He lifted the window curtain, opened the window and peered out. Squinting and tilting his face up to the early afternoon sun, he saw the open windows above him. After a few weeks of crisp, cold weather, the unusually mild November day had likely prompted his neighbor to air out her place. Nate silently waited a few moments. Nothing.

Slightly tense, he picked the Cheerios off his lap and reluctantly went back to eating. Still hearing nothing, he slurped on the spoon a little, quickly intercepting a stream of milk down his chin with a napkin. He hoped that one shout was the end of whatever was going on. As he scooped up the last Cheerio, he caught himself trying not to tap the bowl with the spoon, trying to stay quiet, his ears alert as a fox’s for another sign of discord.

He forced himself to relax his shoulders, to breathe normally. He reminded himself that one distinct drawback to living in Boston was getting to know neighbors intimately, whether he wanted to or not. And today, like most days, it really was “not.” He’d allowed himself the Sunday luxury of sleeping in as long as he could—until after noon—then he’d cracked open his briefcase and worked about an hour before he’d realized he’d forgotten to eat breakfast.

Nate put the bowl to his lips and drained the rest of his milk, feeling the sweet coldness slide down his throat, before carrying the bowl to the sink. He washed it carefully and rubbed it with a clean towel until it squeaked. He did the same with the spoon and replaced both in the overhead cabinet.

But then, there it was again.

Another wordless, indignant female scream echoed through the alley between buildings and into Nate’s kitchen. He stood motionless and tried again to talk himself out of his discomfort, this time attempting to be annoyed at the noise, the way a normal city dweller would be.

At least he’d already been awake and the racket hadn’t dragged him out of slumber, he told himself. Who was she yelling at, anyway? He didn’t even hear another voice.

He took the three steps to his sofa and fell onto it. He fumbled underneath his butt for the remote. A little channel surfing for half an hour wouldn’t put him too far behind, he thought. He needed a little downtime in his week. Besides, the TV would drown out his upstairs neighbor until she quit for the day, which, Nate hoped, was before he had to get down to serious work.

But before he could press the On button, there was a loud crash over his head, accompanied by an incredulous shriek.

Then silence.

Nate jolted upright.

There was someone with her. And it sounded like someone she’d pushed too far—someone who was going to hurt her. If he hadn’t already.

Nate tensed, waiting, his senses at attention. Then he heard another crash, like a piece of furniture hitting the wall, and another cry of outrage.

An image of the woman he’d never met flashed in his mind. Her features were unrecognizable, but there was terror in her eyes as she cowered, fearful of the next blow that was sure to come. He felt her terror now.

He had known it himself, long ago.

Nate leaped off the sofa and ran to his open window. “Hey!” he yelled, aware that his interference would be ineffective against someone like his own father, but hoping the man upstairs was a different kind of coward. “Hey! What’s going on up there?”

The woman yelled again, but what he heard couldn’t be right: “What is this freaking game?”

Game? Still at the window, Nate stared out at the parking lot, his thoughts tumbling over each other. Was someone playing some kind of sick “game” with her? Some twisted sex game, maybe? He knew one of his colleagues in the D.A.’s office had had a case like that a few months back. A man had inadvertently killed his wife while trying some kind of sadistic—

Over Nate’s head, the banging became rhythmic, like someone pounding the floor. “Come on!” the woman screamed. “Come on… Oh, God! No! No!”

Nate’s fury overwhelmed him. He dashed into his bedroom and blindly grabbed his baseball bat out of a corner. Then he ran down the short hallway, slipping a bit in his socks on the hardwood floor, and threw open his door. He raced up the stairwell, one flight, and without knocking, pushed open the door to the apartment directly above his own. He slid into the middle of the living room, bat raised, and the woman, sitting alone on the floor in front of the television, jumped to her feet and screamed.

“Are you okay?” he demanded.

The woman dropped her hands from her mouth. “Who the hell are you?” she shrieked.

Nate momentarily ignored her, scanning the room and the adjoining kitchenette, then stomping into her bedroom, then her bathroom, despite her cry of “Hey!”

Empty. Confirming she was alone, he returned to the living room, where she still stood, eyes wide, and he finally answered, “I live downstairs. I heard you yelling and—”

“And so you just rushed in here? Into my apartment?” The woman stared at him a minute. “Well, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you. It’s just that I get very emotional about—”

“Are you okay?” Nate repeated. Frankly, she looked fine to him. Better than fine. She was gorgeous. Her blond hair was cropped short, like a boy’s, but her face was nothing but feminine—small turned-up nose, full pouty lips and enormous, milk-chocolate brown eyes.

She made some kind of sound, which sounded to Nate like part relieved sob and part laugh. “Well, a half-naked man just crashed into my living room with a baseball bat, apparently about to beat me up for making too much noise. Not a usual Sunday afternoon occurrence, but yeah, I’m pretty okay.”

Nate looked down at his ratty old jeans, only realizing now he was shirtless. “Where is he?” he asked, but his tone had softened a little bit.

She shook her head in confusion. “Wh-what? Who?”

“You were yelling. I heard you. And there was all that noise, banging around. Someone was…hurting you?”

“Oh, no.” She covered her mouth with her hands again. “Oh, no, I’m so sorry.” But her eyes were suddenly laughing. “It’s the game.”

“Yeah, I heard that, too—a game. What game?”

She pointed at the television. “Football game.”

Nate tore his eyes away from the woman’s enchanting face to the TV, where the announcer was saying, “And at the end of the first half, the score is the Denver Broncos 13, the New England Patriots 10.” Then a commercial, two guys walking through a desert, wishing for some great beer.

Nate kept his eyes on the screen. “The game? This game?”

“Yes. See,” the woman explained hurriedly, “I usually watch the game down at the Bull Pen, but my date stood me up. Normally I’d just go solo, because after all, I’m not going to let an inconsiderate idiot ruin my day, but I’m short on money this week anyhow and the Pats game was on regular TV. So I’m watching it here.” She gestured lamely at the television, then bent to pick the remote control off the floor where she had been sitting. She muted the set before continuing. “I get a little, um, emotional about my team. There were a few incomplete passes that made me flip a couple of chairs over, and I was yelling no because Denver intercepted the ball and they were running up the field for a touchdown and I couldn’t believe it and I kind of started banging on the floor…. Wait, you ran up here because you thought someone was hurting me?”

Nate nodded mutely, then sank onto her ugly orange sofa. He looked back at her, taking in the red-white-and-blue football jersey and jeans she wore, then dropped the bat with a clatter on the floor by his feet. He took in the scantily furnished room, and saw that the couple of chairs in it were, in fact, lying on their side.

“Thank you,” the woman said sincerely. “I mean it. Thank you.” She studied his face. “Are you okay? You seem really upset. I’m so, so sorry.”

Nate wasn’t sure how he was feeling. He had rushed up here, thinking he was rescuing someone from the kind of abusive terror he himself had had to live with for so long. Now, seeing this woman standing over him, obviously unhurt, was almost too much of a relief. “I’m, uh, I’m just a little embarrassed, is all.”

“Don’t be,” the woman said vehemently. “I’m so grateful—just as grateful as I would have been if someone really was hurting me and you came to save me. Really,” she said. “I’m just so sorry for getting carried away in here with the windows open. I wish I could make it up to you…wait, I can. Why don’t you stay? I’ll make something to eat and I have enough soda and beer for both of us, I think.”

“You want me to stay?”

“Sure I do. I mean, I don’t know you, but you passed the friend test immediately by running in here to rescue me. Not too many of the friends I have now would do that, I’ll bet, including the creep who stood me up today.” She walked backward into her kitchenette, talking all the way to the refrigerator. “He wasn’t my type, anyhow,” she added, yanking a six-pack of diet soda from the fridge and pulling two cans off their plastic rings. Then she slammed the door shut with a nudge of one blue-jeaned hip. “Not that I’m actively searching for my type, mind you. But I digress.” She tossed him one can, and Nate reached out for it, the cold condensation suddenly shocking the nerve endings in his fingers. “I’d love to have a friend in this building. Besides, if you were a true psycho, you would have bonked me over the head and taken my two pieces of real jewelry and the six bucks in my wallet by now. Come on, stay. Watch the game.”

Nate was having trouble keeping up with her train of thought, being a little weary from the emotions that had surged through him in the last few minutes. He popped open his can and took a long swig, nearly choking when the woman exclaimed, “I’m not trying to flirt with you or get a date with you or anything like that. Don’t get me wrong, okay?” She took a small sip of her own soda. “I mean, nice chest and everything, but that’s not why I’m asking you. I value my single status. It’s just that you just seem so…nice.”

She squinted at Nate the way he imagined a psychiatrist would scrutinize a patient. He avoided psychiatrists, since he didn’t find it necessary to pay someone to remind him that his childhood had been messed up. But this woman’s searching stare was unnerving him. “You’re not a psychiatrist or psychologist or therapist of any kind, are you?” he asked.

“No, sorry, can’t help you there,” she said, then she laughed. “Watch the game. You can tell me your problems at the time-outs, if you want, and I’ll see what I can do.”

Her vivacity was infectious and it was tough not to smile back at her. “Do you think you can control yourself with another person in the room?” he asked. “I don’t want to duck flying furniture for the whole second half.”

She gave him a cocky grin. “No, of course not. Maybe with a guest here, I can try to keep a lid on it.” She extended her hand. He took it, and her skin felt cool and delicate but, at the same time, warm and immediately reassuring.

“I’m Josey.”

Chapter One

About a year and a half later