Chapter 4: No Way

Is this really happening? Stella asked herself. Eyes wide. Mouth wider.

Using her cellphone as a flashlight, she watched three guys circling a smaller one in the middle of her driveway. Like they were in a barroom brawl. Not fifteen feet from her front door.

She didn’t know if she should run back inside, press record, or call 911.

Not that it mattered. Before she could decide, the door to Bennett’s house flew open and like a creature straight out of mythology, he flew across the drive with three more shapes racing after him.

Everything blurred.

From there, things didn’t get better. They got worse.

Bennett and his friends only added to the frensy.

At last count, more than six people were punching, kicking, and who knows what else to each other. With no signs of stopping.

Someone could get seriously hurt. Die even.

Stella took two steps back towards her own front porch. This was crazy. She wasn’t made for this. But something inside her wouldn’t let her back down.

“The police are on the way!” She shouted, raising her phone up high. “Get out of here!”

Stella couldn’t believe what came next.

Everyone stopped what they were doing. And instead of charging her, they scampered away.

The first three brushed off the dirt and gravel as they went. Then the three that rushed out of Bennett’s house, went back inside carrying the smaller one. Man or woman, Stella couldn’t tell. But with the way the other three spoke in hushed tones and carried them, it was clear to Stella they were all close.

Until finally, it was just her standing there alone in the driveway. Still holding up her phone. Well, Stella and Bennett. He hadn’t returned to his house with the others.

She knew he was there. She heard him breathing. She felt his stare.

“You shouldn’t have done that.” Bennett growled from the shadows.

For the first time since meeting him, Stella found her tongue. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I didn’t actually call the cops.”

“I didn’t mean that.”

Stella was confused. What shouldn’t she have done?

Wait. She knew what he meant. He meant break up the fight. He just said—no growled—that she shouldn’t have broken up the fight.

“Right.” She breathed. Feeling a whole new kind of fire burning in her belly. Taking hold of her tongue.

She took two strides towards the shadowy Bennett Orloff. Stepped right up to him, so they were toe to toe.

“Are you seriously telling me I shouldn’t have stopped the brawl that couldn’t gotten your own friend killed?”

“My business is not your business.” His voice was uncontrolled. Raw.

Just like Stella’s last nerve.

“Not my business?” She huffed. Jabbing a finger into his chest. Ignoring the fact, she might have sprained it, he was so rock hard.

What’s with those muscles she wondered. Instantly pushing the thought aside. She was too angry to be turned on.

“This is my property,” she continued. “I live here.” Stella stopped jabbing his chest long enough to point at her own, once stately Queen Anne behind her. “In the only home I’ve ever had as my own.” She sucked in a long, staccato breath. Suddenly overwhelmed. As if she might burst into tears.

The thought of crying in front of this man, this cold monster, it only made her angrier.

“How can you not care?” she demanded.

With his big powerful hands, he grabbed hold of her finger. Pushing it aside. Let it go.

“You need to stop doing that.” He said.

Stella clenched her jaw to keep from screaming. She balled her fists to keep from jabbing him again. He was impossible. This man next door.

“It’s too dangerous.” He said in a low voice. It sounded ragged, rough.

“I can take care of myself.” Stella insisted.

He was there, he should know.

The air stirred. She couldn’t see him well, but sensed he was shaking his head.

“It’s not that easy.”

She heard something new in his voice. He sounded… weary. Tired.

He took her hands in his. Slowly. Gently.

They felt ragged. Rough. Not the hands she’d seen that morning, collecting the letters she’d spilled along with everything else when she crashed into him.

She squinted at him in the dark. Was he taller? She wondered. They never had stood so close before.

He leaned his body into hers. She could feel the heat rolling off him. Speaking softly in her ear. His thumb tilting her chin so that only she could hear. “I’d hate for anything to happen to you because of me.”

A stubborn curl broke free from its binding as he spoke. He reached out to tuck it back in place.

Such a tender gesture. Yet, his fingers felt like sandpaper on her cheek.

Something inside Stella began to stir.