“Landon…”

“I don’t need a ring. I just need you.”

Now I’m crying. “I just need you.”

“Then please, don’t worry about this.”

I pause, battling my nature to worry.

“All right.”

“All right.” He lets out one of those sighs, but it doesn’t make me nervous this time. “I’ll be home soon. Meet me there?”

“You want me to head out now?” I look to Alec, and he pushes off his knees and grabs his coat.

“Yeah. I…I miss you.”

“I miss you, too.” And I say it the same way he did…as if we haven’t seen each other in weeks. I tap the end button on Jace’s cell and hand it back, then snort a little when my knees crack as I stand.

Alec sings to me on the way home, and I join in a few times but keep my voice low because he’s so much better than I am. He starts “I Get a Kick Out of You,” but I stop him, requesting “You Are My Dream” instead.

“I’ll walk up with you,” he says, parking in Theresa’s extra stall. “I gotta get something from Theresa.”

We hop into the elevator and I tease him by threatening to push all the buttons. He stands in front of them till we get to my floor.

The guy waiting for the elevator pushes inside before we can get out. Geez, buddy…and I almost say something out loud, but he’s huge and got a bag full of laundry or something, a guitar case, and a laptop, and I don’t want to get whacked. Alec puts his hand on the small of my back and moves me around elevator guy and onto the floor. I pull out my keys, but something catches my eye halfway down the hall and I stop dead. Alec takes a few steps ahead of me before stopping too.

“You okay?”

“Theresa’s door is open.” I point to the cracked door, darkness inside, and my heart kicks up in an offbeat pattern.

Alec grabs my elbow when I start marching over.

“No,” he says, and then moves in front of me to go first.

“I’m still coming with you,” I hiss back. I’ve got a pocketbook full of change I’m willing to swing in anyone’s face if I have to.

He takes cautious yet determined steps forward, nudging the door open wide and finding the light. I draw in a sharp breath, heart now beating through my ears. Theresa’s apartment is trashed; drawers open in the kitchen, balcony door open, and the storage unit spilling contents. I don’t even get out any words before Alec is charging down the hall toward the back bedroom. He trips over discarded belongings and shoes and what-have-you, bouncing off the walls, so I flip on the lights as we make our way to Theresa’s bedroom.

I have a feeling that elevator guy was not carrying laundry.

Chapter 30

Alec does a sort of Superman burst-open-the-door maneuver and smacks the overhead light on. Theresa’s room is just as bad, but a flood of relief warms behind my pounding heart when she sort of whines and stretches on her mattress, blocking her eyes from the sudden brightness of the room.

“What the hell?”

I rush to her side and pick her up in my arms. My hands are shaking, and I feel Theresa’s relaxed posture suddenly tense.

“Where’s Landon? Is he okay?”

I nod, and her eyes widen.

“Jace?”

I nod again, and her gaze drifts to Alec, eyebrows drawing inward.

“Uh…” he starts. “Your front door was open.”

Theresa drops out of my hold, arm reaching at the mattress next to her. The events of the night start to dawn on me, and I’m praying that she had no emotional attachment to the guy who obviously banged, burglarized, and bailed.

“He must’ve left it open when he left.” She lets out a laugh at the both of us. “Y’all are such worrywarts. Let me go back to sleep.”

“Theresa…” I shake my head. “Your place is a mess.”

“Thank you, Mom. What else is new?” She laughs again. Alec takes a step forward, and her smile starts to fade when she sees the concern laced with anger in his eyes. I actually have to do a double take because I’ve only see him look that way a few times and it’s a little frightening.

“It’s ransacked,” he says. “Shit is everywhere, and I’ll bet you there’s missing shit, too.”

“What?” Theresa tosses the comforter over my head, and I feel her scramble off the mattress. When I uncover myself, Theresa’s only in a large T-shirt, digging in her nightstand, shaking her head and saying, “No-no-no-no-no.”

“What are you looking for?” Alec asks, stepping up to watch helplessly as Theresa comes up short.

“My necklace. I was wearing it tonight, but I took it off before we…shit.”

“What necklace?” I ask.

“Christmas present. I didn’t have it for long, but…I liked it.”

She and Alec share a look, Alec’s eyes getting angrier and angrier, but then they break contact and she shoves her way down the hall. We follow, stopping behind her as she stares at her belongings strewn over her floor.

“That rat bastard!” she says, moving everything off her side table. “He took my laptop, too.”

“Do you have your phone?” I ask, thinking it when Alec pulls out his own. Theresa shakes her head.

“Doubt it.” She grapples for a pair of jeans and shoves her legs in. “I’m going to cut off his nut sack.”

I set my jaw. I’ll hold those nasty balls in place while she snips, but Alec steps in front of us.

“You’re not going.”

“Move,” Theresa demands, eyes blazing like she’ll injure Alec just to get to the burglar banger.

He shakes his head, leans against the door, and brings his phone to his ear. Theresa gives him a hard punch to the shoulder and he doesn’t even flinch.

“Hi, I’d like to report a robbery,” Alec says, and I’m glad one of us has our head, because if elevator guy is also the guy who took off with Theresa’s stuff—most likely—then we’d have no chance in hell of holding him down. Unless I use my pepper spray and Theresa uses her Taser. I imagine an assault record wouldn’t look good to the in-laws, though.

“Yeah, it’s apartment 7G at—”

“What the living hell?”

Alec shoves off the door at the outburst, pausing in the middle of Theresa’s address and letting us pass him to look down the hall. Josh Happerfeld in 7J is staring at his door, his phone pressed to his ear, and he yells, “Someone kicked my damn door in!”

That heart pounding starts up again, and I look across the hall at 7H. The door looks fine but it’s ajar, just like Theresa’s. I jerk my head toward my apartment, feeling queasy and panicked, and when I look at Theresa, her mouth is slightly open in apology. As if this is her fault.

“Landon’s movie…” I say, and I’m not even sure it’s coherent, but I take off down the hall, praying my door isn’t kicked in or open. But if it is, the burglar could’ve cleaned the whole house out and I wouldn’t care…as long as Landon’s movie is still safe. It’s an impossible wish, because Landon was working on it last night. Glasses on his adorable work face, and that laptop was sitting on our card table, right by the door.

I’m shaking so bad I can’t get my key in. The door wasn’t bashed in or open, but I’m not ruling anything out until I see inside.

Finally jamming it in the lock, I twist and shove my way in, expecting to trip over a mess or to have my entire world pulled out from under me…but the floor is as spotless as I left it, the TV still hung on the wall, my laptop perched on the coffee table, and I run to the card table toward the hum of Landon’s computer. I pick it up, hug it to my chest, and crumple to a complete heap on the floor.

“Oh, thank the Lord,” Theresa says somewhere near me. I sit with the laptop and try to get the warmth of it to calm my crazy heartbeat. She takes a spot next to me, and I don’t know why I’m the one getting emotional since all my stuff is still here, but I start to tear up, squeezing the computer so hard I make imprints on my arms.