Page 49 of Captivating Anika
“Okay, I’ll check with her after. Do you have the key?”
Anika lets go of my hand and pulls her keys from her pocket.
“It’s in my office, I’ll go grab it.”
She unlocks the back door, disarms the alarm, and slips inside, while we stand guard outside.
“It doesn’t sound good,” I observe.
Bill shakes his head, his lips pressed together. “No, it doesn’t. I also spoke to the nursing home and was told the last time Kim had been in to see her mother was Wednesday.”
Anika appears with the keys and hands them off to Bill, who leads the way up the stairs.
“Want you to wait here,” he says when we get to the small landing. “I’m gonna do a quick check first.”
Anika’s hand finds mine again as soon as he disappears inside. He’s only gone for a minute when he pulls the door open.
“No one’s here. Want to have a quick look and tell me if anything looks out of place or off to you?” he asks Anika, stepping aside to let her through.
She reappears shortly after, shaking her head.
“I don’t see anything odd. She didn’t bring over a lot of stuff, mainly clothes, and from what I can tell those are still here. Her phone charger is still on the kitchen counter. Her e-reader on the bedside table.”
Anika sidles up to me, and I slip an arm around her.
Evans nods. “I agree. Nothing in there sends up any flags.”
He locks the door and gestures for us to go ahead down the stairs. When we get to the bottom, he looks up at the apartment one last time before sharing his thoughts with us.
“And yet everything about this feels wrong.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Hog
I carefully crack an eyelid against the morning light filtering in. I slept in.
The next thing I become aware of is that I’m alone in bed. I gingerly lift my head to check the bathroom, but the light is off. Then I hear some noises from downstairs and catch a whiff of coffee.
Coffee. I could do with some to clear the fog in my head. Although, when I do a quick assessment of my body, I discover I’m in pretty decent shape. Sure, my body is sore and the burns feel a bit tight, but nothing like the last few days. The best part is I have no throbbing headache this morning.
It’s Sunday today. Anika’s day off. She needs it after the week she’s had.
Yesterday, despite barely having slept the night before, she was at the salon early. Since there was still no sign of Kim, they had their hands full covering her customers. She was a physical and emotional mess when she rolled in close to five last night. She was able to do little more than have a quick bite of the simple dinner I put together while she was gone, and rolled into bed shortly after with her meds on board.
It’s funny, I thought I knew Anika pretty well, but spending this time with her, I’m discovering new layers of complexity that perhaps weren’t as visible before.
Like her deep sense of responsibility for her friends, her employees, even her business. Her resilience too, which wasn’t something that was obvious from the outside, but watching her roll with the punches this past week has been eye-opening.
Also new to me is, Anika is bold in the way she shows affection. She’s not shy to touch and has no problem sharing how she likes to be touched. She’s all about the physical connection, whether it’s holding my hand or pressing up to me in bed.
I’m not complaining. I loved how responsive and at times assertive she was that first night, but also enjoy the more PG-rated snuggles we’ve shared since then.
Swinging my legs out of bed, I pause for a second to let the brief wave of dizziness pass, before I head to the bathroom. I have an appointment to see the doctor for a follow-up this coming Friday and hope my equilibrium is back by then. I really want to get back to work, too much downtime messes with my head.
Anika is at the stove and turns her head when I enter the kitchen a little later, flashing me a grin. I walk up and slip my arms around her from behind, pressing a kiss in the crook of her neck.
“What are you cooking? That smells amazing.”