I step forward, right into her space. “You have no clue how this works, narushitel. You’ve never met a man like me before now.” I see her cowering, so I tone it down ever so slightly. “Still, I’m glad to see we’re on the same page.”
“So—we’re good?” She sounds hopeful. Her hand on the door is tightening, eager to close it in my face and bring this unexpected chapter of her life to a merciful close.
Not so fast, princess.
“Actually, no.” When I say that, she freezes, the color on her cheeks shifting from blush pink to deep red. “The second reason I came over is to check on you.”
She narrows her eyes. “Did you expect me to fall to pieces or something? Because I’m not gonna lie, you’re very good at sex, but I’m not as much of a fragile, bitter spinstress as my Garfield panties might’ve made it appear.”
The orange cat has a name. Who knew?
“There’s been a spate of breakins in the area and the cops just issued an alert that there was more suspicious activity around this neighborhood tonight. My security just informed me.”
She recoils in surprise. She looks rattled but I suppose that’s a natural response to hearing of suspicious activity in your neighborhood. Especially if you’re a single woman living on your own. I decide not to read too much into it…
Yet.
“Oh… Uh, okay. I-I should probably go check on Mrs. Heidegger.”
I shake my head. “You shouldn’t be walking around on your own at this time, Alyssa.”
She opens her mouth to say something else, but then her eyes dart past me and she retreats backward into her foyer. “Wait… who’s that?”
I turn to Vincent and feign unfamiliarity. His mustache twitches as he does the same. “Good evening, Officer,” I greet. “Everything alright?”
“Good evening, Mr.—” Vincent makes a show of looking down at this phone before he looks back up at me. “—Bugrov?”
“That’s right.”
“Your home was broken into last night, am I correct?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
Vincent nods. “I’m here because we received a dispatch signal.” He makes eye contact with Alyssa. “Apparently, there’s been some suspicious activity around your house, too, ma’am.”
Alyssa looks borderline panicked now. “S-suspicious activity… what does that mean?”
“It means that there are people skulking around this neighborhood looking for trouble. It’s possible drugs are involved. You live alone, ma’am?”
Alyssa nods. “Yes.”
“Mind if I take a look around the premises?”
“Inside the house?” she balks.
Hiding something in there, kiska? I wonder to myself. While Alyssa is focused on Vincent, I take out my phone and type a quick text to Ratimir. I’m at the front door of the shack. Go around back and break a window. I need a diversion.
“No, ma’am. I’m just gonna do a quick search around your property so I can determine if there’s been any attempted breakins or movement around the house.”
She glances at me. “I haven’t heard anything about this before tonight.”
“We don’t want to alarm people unnecessarily, ma’am,” the detective explains, giving her a warm smile. “We like to handle these situations under the radar. There are a lot of older folks living in this neighborhood and we’re always mindful of how we roll out information.”
“But Uri—I mean, Mr. Bugrov was informed tonight.”
She’s definitely suspicious of something. But Vincent has credibility. I planted him in the L.A. police force years ago. I wasn’t interested in finding a crooked cop and putting him on my payroll; I wanted someone who was already loyal to the Bugrov Bratva infiltrating the department.
Enter Vinny. With his deep brown eyes and dark blonde hair, he looks like a Ken doll in uniform. No one distrusts Ken.
“Mr. Bugrov has licensed security that we can communicate with directly. We—”
BOOM!
The sound of shattering glass has Alyssa jumping in place. She whirls around and her jaw drops when she realizes that it’s coming from her house.
Vincent rips his gun out and makes a very convincing fake call for backup into his walkie-talkie before he turns to me urgently. “Get her to your house and keep her there, sir.” Then he darts around back to try and accost the “intruder.”
Alyssa is breathing hard and looking around as though the sky is going to cave in on us at any moment—which, conveniently enough, is exactly the headspace I want her in right now. It means that when I grab her hand and pull her towards my house, she doesn’t put up a fight. She’s a ragdoll in my arms. She barely even speaks until we’re inside and the door is closed.