Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 84394 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 338(@250wpm)___ 281(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 84394 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 422(@200wpm)___ 338(@250wpm)___ 281(@300wpm)
He’s a stranger and his problems are none of my business. Not my circus, not my delicious but troubled lobby lurker. I have too many balls in the air as it is.
Balls.
See what I did there? Not even trying.
Chapter Two
Joey
“This will be your elevator, Mr. Redmond.”
Mr. Gordon, holding a binder of paperwork and what I imagine are my keys and security codes, shuttles me into the large, semi-private lift I’ll be sharing with only two other tenants.
The whole building has a gothic industrial feel. Marble floors and old iron beams with huge rivets supporting the walls, as well as exposed brick and artfully chipped away plaster. The elevator has a similar design. I can’t help wondering what this place used to be in its former life, before they turned it into modern apartments.
“Elegant,” I say politely, privately wondering if the architect was trying to summon demons while drawing up the specs for the remodel. But let’s go with elegant or I’ll have nightmares. “My old apartments had an elevator that liked to take short naps between floors on a regular basis. I called her Martha.”
And thinking about her is helping with my own elevator issues, so thank God for Martha.
“This lift is brand new and state of the art,” Mr. Gordon tells me. “We’ve never had a single problem.”
“I’m sure it’s great,” I hurry to assure him, since he sounds a little defensive. “My brother-in-law can’t stop talking about all the security bells and whistles he helped install recently. I think he’s jealous I got the last apartment. He loves it here.”
My new home is a five-story building with a total of fourteen apartments, two elevators and this one-man Jack-of-all-trades I’m not sure what to make of. Is he the landlord? The butler? The sparkly fairy godfather of fruit baskets?
“Carter is always welcome.” He clears his throat and glances at me over his shimmery specs. “Now about the fourth floor.”
Apparently one of my elevator triad—the woman who has the entire floor below me to herself—is adamant about her privacy. Since he’s already mentioned it in our emails, including the tidbit about the elevator not opening on her floor without a key and a specific security code, I’m getting the underlying gist. Keep. Out.
“As far as I’m concerned, the fourth floor doesn’t exist,” I swear solemnly, holding up my free hand.
He looks appeased, but I think we both know I’m lying. I know it exists. And why does one person need that much private space with the equivalent of a barbed wire fence around it? Does she own a black-market petting zoo? Did she turn her floor into an ice-skating rink? Does she collect corpses and want privacy for her reanimation experiments? I almost don’t want to know.
But I still want to know. You know?
“What about my neighbor?” I ask, to take my mind off the fourth-floor mystery. “You haven’t mentioned anything about them yet. Anything I should look out for?”
Another discreet glance and throat-clearing. “Yes, well, he’s a private man, and he shouldn’t bother you. In fact, he’s currently on six-month sabbatical to write his next bestseller.”
“A writer?” I could be neighbors with a writer. “Two of my brothers are published.”
They never went on sabbatical to do it, but still.
I’m now imagining my neighbor drinking Mai Tais and asking two bikini-clad admirers if they want to help him with his “research.” I don’t mean to be judgmental, but that’s what sabbatical sounds like to me. JD wrote his book on a phone in a bar, while Stewart got his epic done on an antique typewriter in a tree stand surrounded by squirrels.
We’ll talk about Stewart later.
“A whole floor to myself for six months?” I smile at him, but his expression tells me I’m mistaken. “No? Does my neighbor have a roommate?”
“A guest,” Mr. Gordon says, sounding relieved to get that out of the way. “Mr. Ransom is looking after things, as well as taking time to visit his family, while his old college friend is away.”
He’s silent for a moment before continuing. “You may have noticed he was somewhat abrupt this evening, but I can assure you he’s been a near-perfect tenant since he arrived. The other day, he bought tickets to a baseball game for the whole building, handed them off to me and asked me not to give him any credit. Several residents have noted that he’s been helpful to them as well. Everyone finds him appealing.”
“You’re saying the guy in the lobby is my temporary next-door neighbor?”
“He is.”
My only neighbor, because the floor only has two apartments.
Mr. Ransom, the appealing, generous, family-oriented baseball enthusiast with godlike glutes is going to be sharing my special elevator access and my garbage chute, as well as my living room wall?
Mr. Ransom.
That’s not a real name. He’s not a real person.
What is my life right now?