Number Neighbors - Emma Hart Page 0,9

ass, the pensioners were far too into their discussion about Heather’s latest escapades to care that I was eating all the goldfish crackers and Edam cheese.

What? They went surprisingly well together.

After listening to them arguing over the merits of voyeurism for a solid five minutes, I peered into the cat box at a sleeping but snotty Lucifer, then disappeared into the kitchen with my empty wine glass.

The canary yellow clock on the wall—one of Grandma’s new finds from wherever the hell she found her questionable décor.

I had no idea how Immy put up with it.

Maybe she spent more time at Mason’s these days. God only knew I would.

I poured a small glass of wine and leaned against the counter. I didn’t have long until I had to be home in time for my late night texting date, and I also needed to make sure Lucifer ate a little something and had some water before bed.

I tapped my finger against my lips. Maybe I needed to take Isaac up on his offer to take a look at the kitten. Being able to say ‘he’ or ‘she’ would undoubtedly be an improvement on ‘it,’ and I wanted to make sure it wasn’t dying or anything.

I knew nothing about cats. Except that they were assholes, but everyone who’d ever been on the internet knew that.

Even people who didn’t know what the internet was probably knew that.

“My God,” Immy said, walking into the kitchen with a heavy exhale. “They get worse every week.”

“I’m dreading their next book pick,” I admitted. “They seem to be getting sexier and sexier.”

“No kidding. I’m worried they’re going to look into field trips to local sex toy stores or something.”

“Stores?” I raised my eyebrows. “I’m worried they’re going to hunt down sex clubs and put their study into practice.”

Immy shuddered as she refilled her glass, almost spilling the last of the wine onto the countertop. “Shh, Han. Don’t say it that loud. They might hear you and actually do it.”

I wrinkled my nose. The last thing I wanted to do was give those horny old ladies any ideas. Knowing them as well as I did, none of it would stay as ideas.

“Hannah!” Grandma yelled from the living room. “Your kitten is snotting all over its box!”

“It’s not my kitten,” I muttered, putting down my glass.

“It’s totally your kitten,” Immy replied with a smirk.

I stuck my middle finger up at her and went back into the living room.

For that, I was scooping up the kitten that was not my kitten and leaving Immy to handle the octogenarians by herself.

That’d teach her.

***

I needed a vet.

The problem? It was ten o’clock at night.

Twenty-four hours after leaving the book club, I was sitting on my kitchen floor, cleaning up the second load of cat sick today.

It wasn’t really what I’d planned to do today.

Lucifer was clearly really unwell, and a quick Google search confirmed what I’d feared: I should have taken it to the vet the moment I saw the cold coming on.

Guilt tinged every part of me. The poor little thing had been unwell because I just hadn’t done what I should have done.

I was so, so mad at myself. Despite my neutral feelings toward the little black furry critter, I did love animals, and I didn’t want any animal to suffer.

The only option I had was to go next door and see if Isaac could help me. He’d already said all I had to do was knock on his door, and that was what I was going to have to do.

I finished cleaning the mess and went to Lucifer’s bed where it had procured one of my blankets for itself. I grabbed it and went to the sleeping kitten on the sofa. After wrapping it up tightly, I held it to my chest, picked up my keys, and went outside.

His car was in the driveway, thank God. The last thing I needed right now was to drive to the other side of the town and pay all the emergency vet charges.

Namely, I couldn’t.

I ran across our yards, happily noting that he had lights on in his living room.

No, that wasn’t me being a creeper. Our houses were just laid out the same, okay?

Mostly.

I rapped my knuckles against his door three times. It took a moment, but a shadow in the window gave way to him opening the door.

“Hannah? What’s—” he paused when he saw the bundle in my arms. “Is that the kitten?”

I nodded. “It’s sick. I didn’t know what else