“Not at the moment, but we’ll have to watch out if we’re going to be climbing in and out of windows.”
Then maybe it didn’t matter if I slept in the attic, if it was going to put them and me at risk by drawing attention from anyone. I sighed, gazing back toward the door, now dark, listening for Jimmy.
Gabriel reached for my face, redirecting me by the chin to look at him again. He hovered close, his nose near mine, his eyes half-open as he gazed down at me.
“Never thought we’d be like this again, Sang,” he said quietly. “In this house, alone, waiting for someone to catch us.”
I clutched the fibers of the carpet, much like I’d done sitting downstairs with him months ago. In a closet. Naked. Afraid he’d get caught, yet then, he wouldn’t leave me either.
I couldn’t have made it out without him.
His mouth twitched. His gaze traced over my face, stopping at my cheeks, my chin, my jaw. The deep analysis caused my cheeks to heat.
Those crystal eyes finally traced their way to my lips, holding steady.
He bent forward, kissing me softly enough that our skin barely touched. A brushed kiss that sent a ripple of depth and feeling through me as if he’d kissed every part of me, even if it was brief and simple.
His lips were a touch dry. I relaxed my lips, puckering only a little, afraid to go too far with a deeper kiss, but desperate to feel how he felt for me at that moment. Would he soon have to leave me because Jimmy was getting too close, or because Carol came back to demand that I sleep in the bedroom?
He backed his head away to look at me again. “Feels like ages ago we sat in that closet, and it was only a few months.”
“A lot has changed.”
“Not enough.” He smoothed his fingers across my cheek and tilted his face closer until his forehead nearly touched mine, almost too close to look directly at him, but I couldn’t turn away. The blond locks of his hair seemed to glow against his face in the light. His bright blue eyes were dim, sad. “I promised myself this wouldn’t happen again.”
“We didn’t know what was here,” I said. “But this...isn’t as bad as it could be.” I wanted to give him some hope. I needed to feel the same thing, but I needed to convince him not to do anything too rash.
“Our backs are against the wall,” he said, holding more firmly to my face. He readjusted so he could hold on to each of my cheeks with both palms. “Same rules apply, Trouble. She lays a hand on you, or it looks like anyone does anything, you’re coming with me. No hesitating like last time.”
Could I make such a promise without knowing what would happen?
What would I have to go through to be able to walk away quietly without causing more problems in the future? Last time I’d left, we’d left a door open so that I’d return if called upon to, and now I was here and stuck. I didn’t want to be in this position again.
I didn’t want Gabriel to have to go through this a third time.
We needed to find a way for me to be out without problems. As much as I desired to be with them right at this moment, I needed to be stronger if we were ever going to be out from under all of it.
It was just so hard to be that strong.
Thunder erupted on the stairs. At least we could hear when Jimmy was coming.
Gabriel groaned and pulled away. I started crawling toward the doorway so I could meet him at the door.
Jimmy opened it up before I could fully get to it and started coming in. “Found it,” he said.
He was going to find Gabriel if I wasn’t careful. “Thanks,” I said, getting on my knees and deliberately getting in the way of him coming in further. Gabriel could hide, but not if Jimmy thought he would come in and stay with a light on and poke around. “If I can just plug this in, I’ve got it from here.”
Jimmy paused. “Do I need to bring up an extension cord?”
I didn’t think I could stand him coming back and forth to bring me things. “I’ve got it. Don’t worry. I can vacuum the bedroom, too. Don’t you have to help with dinner?” I forced a smile.
He nodded slowly and backed up. I followed, intending to get the vacuum and hopefully to stop him from wanting to come back into the attic.
I avoided looking at his face. I was too stressed and I was sure if he looked at me too long, he’d see how tense and nervous I was and would know I was hiding something.
The vacuum was just inside the door next to the wall. I found a wide head attachment and sought out a socket to plug it in to. The whirr built up momentum. I spoke louder so he could hear me. “I’ll get started.”
“Don’t forget the corners,” he said, eyeballing me and backing away.
When he thundered down the stairs again, I closed the bedroom door. I locked it at first, out of habit, and then quietly unlocked it. He might find it too weird if I was locking him out.
I sighed.
There was a soft scratch of wood against wood, and then the door opened from the attic. Gabriel peered out. He mouthed at me, “Fuck us.”
I agreed with the sentiment.
The vacuum covered our noises, and I spent a good deal of time getting every corner, and sucking up cobwebs from behind the bookshelf and from the vent. I caught sight of the camera, peered at it. It was tiny.
Someone was watching from it, I was sure. I waved shortly with a couple of fingers at whoever it was.
Gabriel kept the attic door open and quietly went about unpacking my bags. The space was narrow, and the slant of the roof made it so you had to crouch to walk anywhere inside, and it was easier just to crawl. He shoved the small wardrobe around until the right side was up against the wall next to the door, and the wardrobe blocked the view of deeper inside the attic.
Doing this made it so that I’d have to crawl around to get further inside, but it would give him and anyone else a head start into the very back if the door was suddenly opened. Behind the wardrobe and against the rest of the wall, he set up the cot. The foot of it faced the alcove on the far side. He placed a sleeping bag on the cot and then plucked through lots of clothes, rearranging them to place into the wardrobe.
I vacuumed slowly so it could mask what he was doing, although it blocked me from being able to hear what was going on in the house downstairs.
I did the corners first and then the rest of the room. For the sake of it, I took a sock and wiped away dust from the window and around books on the bookshelf. I even pulled out the rest of the clothes from the closet. I didn’t wear them, but I’d make space available for Jimmy.
When things seemed tidy, Gabriel had most of my clothing sorted away in the wardrobe. He had the light working, too, along with the battery-operated heater. “We’re going to need more batteries,” he said. “And we should get them ourselves, so they don’t think this is going to be a waste of their money.”