we could hear it even down in the library. You had to yank this old-fashioned bell-pull out front and put your entire body weight into it to make it work at all.
“I’ll get it,” I told Gus when he started to rise. “No need for you to come.”
“It’s my shoulder that hurts, not my feet,” he said, closing his book.
I waved him off. “It’s okay. I’ll just bring the doctor back here.”
I walked quickly through the house, grateful to finally have something to do with myself. I threw the front door open wide, and blinked in confusion. I was expecting a middle-aged Vietnamese woman with a stethoscope. What I got instead was a young white guy with a pair of hipster glasses and Converse sneakers.
“I’m sorry,” I said, defaulting to politeness out of confusion. “I thought you were Dr. Thao.”
“She’s coming,” the guy said, peering around me into the house. Was it just me, or did he look nervous? “She got stuck in some snow down your driveway. Told me to go on ahead so we didn’t keep you waiting.” He held his hand out. “Hi, I’m Tom. We spoke on the phone earlier.”
So that was why his voice sounded familiar.
“Oh.” I’d thought we’d plowed the driveway better than that. I’d certainly paid enough money for it. “Okay. Well, come in.”
I stepped back and Tom crossed the threshold, looking around the foyer with wide eyes.
“You live here? All by yourself?”
“I—Well, yes. I mean, not currently, but it’s—yeah?”
Not a very coherent response, but I couldn’t figure out why he’d asked the question. I supposed it was a big house for one person. But something about this guy weirded me out.
“Maybe I should go out and help Dr. Thao,” I said. “I’ve got some extra shovels.”
“No, no, she’ll be right along.” Tom gestured to the bag he was carrying. “Do you have somewhere I could set this down?”
“I—yeah, of course.” I pointed to the table by the suit of armor, suddenly seeing my house through a stranger’s eyes and realizing how deeply weird it was to have a suit of armor in your foyer.
I peered out through the still open front door. I couldn’t see a car anywhere. “How far back did she get stuck?”
“Oh, not far,” Tom said, rustling in his bag. “I’m sure she’ll be here in a second.”
I turned and saw him pull what looked like a headphone cord out of the bag. “Do you always come on house calls with her?”
“I’m just here for the paperwork,” Tom said.
“Holden? Are you guys coming, or are you—oh, hi.”
Gus’s voice came out of the hall, followed by Gus himself. He looked confused. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Tom clip the cord to his shirt, then stick an earbud into his ear.
“I thought Dr. Thao was a woman,” Gus said.
“Oh, she is.” Tom smiled as we both looked at him, then pulled his cellphone out of his bag and plugged the end of his headphones into it. He held the phone up to my face, a small but blinding white light shining out of it. “But she’s not coming just yet.”
“What do you mean?” Gus asked, but Tom wasn’t looking at him anymore. All his attention was focused on me.
“I wasn’t sure of your exact address before,” he said, his smile still bright and anodyne. “I never dreamt it would just fall into my lap at my day job, of all places. But there was no way I could pass up an opportunity to talk to you in person, once I had it. I mean, especially this close to the anniversary.”
His smile widened into something predatory. “So, Eric. Do you have anything you want to say to your fans?”
13
Ari
“What’s going on?” I looked at Holden in confusion.
Why had that guy called him another name? And what anniversary was he referring to?
The guy trained his phone on me. “You don’t know?”
“Know what?” I said, starting towards them again. I stopped halfway across the room though, when Holden stepped in front of the guy angrily.
“Get. Out.”
I’d never heard his voice so cold.
“Oh, come on. This is free publicity, man. I can put you on my blog, and you can—”
“Out.” Holden repeated, and I swear the temperature in the room dropped thirty degrees.
I realized, at that moment, that all the times I’d seen Holden angry before, it had been a hot temper. But this was icy, and way scarier than anything he’d ever turned on me.
I took another step forward. “Holden,