Page 8 of Protected By Razor

“Good,” I say. “That’s really helpful.”

She ducks her head. I’ve paid her a compliment and she doesn’t know what to do with it.

“The note,” I say. “You still have it?”

She nods and pulls it out of her bag. I unfold it. Mind your own business. Black ink, block capitals, pressed hard. I look at the back. The indents are deep. Whoever wrote this was angry when they wrote it.

I fold it again. I keep it.

“Darcie.”

Her eyes come up.

“This isn’t random. You know that, yeah?”

“I know.”

“Someone’s running an operation. You stumbled onto part of it. The dog, the owner, the note, the car — they’re all connected, and they’re all scared enough of you talking to make you stop talking.”

“I figured.”

“Good. Then you’ll understand what I’m about to say.”

I can see her bracing.

“I’m staying here until we know who this is and we’ve handled it.”

Her mouth opens. “But…Razor.”

It’s the first time she’s said my name tonight. It goes through me like a hook. I don’t let her see it.

“Not negotiable,” I say. “I’ll take the couch. You won’t know I’m here most of the time. You go to work, I go with you. You come home, I’m home. Anyone so much as looks at you wrong, they deal with me instead.”

“I can’t?— you don’t have to??—”

“I’m not doing you a favour. Kate called me because she knows I can handle this, and I will handle this.”

She looks at me. There’s something in her face I can’t quite read. It’s not just fear. It’s not just relief. It’s something more complicated.

“Okay,” she says quietly.

“Okay.”

I stand up. “I need to make some calls. I’ll be back in an hour with a bag. Lock the door behind me, don’t open it for anyone else. You have my number?”

She nods.

“Use it if anything feels off.”

She nods again.

I leave.

I’m back at nine with a duffel and two bags of groceries because I’m not going to ask her to feed me for a week. I make her eat a sandwich standing in the kitchen because she probably hasn’t eaten since breakfast. I walk the apartment. Every window. The door, the locks, the chain. The angle of the balcony and what you can see from the street. I’m a man who knows how things go bad, and I’d rather know now what I’m working with.

The building’s got too many ways in. One stairwell that doesn’t lock. A back door to a bin area that props open when someone’s been smoking out there. I note all of it.

By ten she’s tired. I can see it sitting on her shoulders.