Page 204 of Darling Venom
I walked the path to my complex, bathed in darkness. The streetlights couldn’t stay lit for more than a second before they flickered off again.
A shadowy figure waited on one of the steep steps leading to my street. I hovered just out of sight at the base of the stairs, biding my time until the person moved.
He didn’t.
I yawned, worried I’d fall asleep standing. I could go around to the next street and hike that set of steps up the hill, but I’d still cross paths with him once I rounded back toward my apartment on the top end.
Might as well do it now and get it over with.
The sleek smart phone lit up in my hand. I debated whom to call. The cops seemed like an obvious bet, but Jonah would get here faster.
So, Jonah it was.
With my trigger-happy thumb hovered over the green call button, I bounded up the stairs. Half-convinced Leah would wake up to find me on the news.
Headline: Body Found at Galileo Playground, Sprawled Across the Uranus Globe.
The streetlamp winked in and out. I switched on the phone’s flashlight, hoping I hadn’t provoked the dude on the steps by shining it in his face.
“Charlie?”
It was Tate.
He squinted and blocked the glare with his palm, dropping it when I pocketed the device.
I came to a halt beside him. “What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for you.”
He sounded bewildered himself.
As if this was a first for him, too.
I watched as he stood and dusted off the back of his suit. Three pieces. Each one well-acquainted with his lean body. And not the type of outfit you wore on this side of the city to wait around for a twenty-two-year-old girl you weren’t dating.
“Took you a while,” he noted.
“How long have you been here?”
“Since I got off work.”
Chill out, heart.
I sucked in a ragged breath. “Which was…”
“Three hours ago, give or take a few minutes.”
Silence blanketed us as we let that sink in.
He waited three hours for me.
HE WAITED THREE HOURS FOR ME.
Then again, I did, too. But at his place. We were in the same book, just stuck in different chapters. Would we ever reach the same page?
I tucked hair behind my ear, playing it cool. “You could have called me.”
You could’ve called him, too.
