“You would be amazed at the props I keep on hand for just such occasions.”
“You stole it, didn’t you?”
“I’m an attaché to the Office of the Potentate of Atlanta. I don’t steal. I acquire.”
I throttled a laugh as we pushed Bonnie to the entrance in time for the doorman to step in our path.
“What the hell is in that?”
Clearly, he had been watching the show, and we had to give the man an answer. “Bonnie Diaz.”
His eyebrows shot so high, he almost struck a low-flying aircraft, and he cranked his head toward Ford. “Is she serious?”
“Oh, yeah.” He nudged the cart forward. “Now, get out of our way.”
The doorman did as he was told, and we squeaked past him into the safety of the lobby, but Ford didn’t follow. He lingered outside, and I might have felt the sudden need to bend down and retie my shoe.
“Midas has a special interest in Hadley,” Ford said. “So do I. Unless you want to get busted down to janitorial work, I would do my damnedest to hide whatever problem you’ve got with her—or any other resident—before our beta makes an example out of you.”
“Ford—”
“She’s a predator. It gets your back up. I feel it too, so I understand, but there are bigger and worse here.”
“I’m not sure about that,” the doorman murmured after noticing I hadn’t kept going.
“I am.” Ford clapped the man on the back. “Suck it up or get demoted while you work on your poker face. Your call.” He entered the lobby and squatted in front of me. “Here, let me help you with that. The bunny goes over the—”
I batted his hands away. “I can tie my own shoe.”
“I can’t tell. You’ve been kneeling here long enough to rethread your laces.”
Annoyed, I jerked a knot in my bow, which made him chuckle under his breath, but I played it off like I had meant to do it.
“I’m going to bed.” I waved to the laundry cart. “Night, Bonnie.” I singled out Bishop next. “Thanks for the assist. Call a full meeting at dusk. We need to put our heads together on this.”
The elevator doors had closed behind me before I heard the first shout. I smacked my palm against the emergency stop button, but it ignored me. Probably because the glide from the lobby to my floor was so short, I was practically there by the time the red light flashed.
Not trusting it a second time, I shoved open the emergency exit door and crashed into a wall of pale fur. “What in the—?”
“Bonnie,” Ford yelled. “Bonnie.”
“Bonnie?” I caught the breath she had knocked out of me. “Explain.”
The last bit had been directed at Ford, since Bonnie had yet to shift back.
“She saw you get in the elevator and lost her ever-lovin’ mind.” He wasn’t winded from the run up two flights of stairs, but he was flustered enough his cheeks had reddened. “She tried to pry you out of the booth. The doors are shredded from her teeth. God, her teeth. She bit through that metal like butter.” He tried, but he couldn’t hide his admiration. “Once she saw the shaft was empty, she used her nose to depress the access bar for the stairs and started climbing.”
Tail between her legs, Bonnie whined pitifully, all but calling Ford a big meanie for chasing her down.
“What floor is her apartment on?” I exhaled. “Tell me it’s above mine.”
“First floor,” he admitted. “She’s got a thing about heights.”
From what little time I had spent with Bonnie, she seemed to have a thing about a lot of things.
“Can she read English in this form? Did she maybe miss her turn?”
Pity twisted his features into what wanted to be a smile. “Afraid not.”
Though she was half the size of my apartment, I still asked, “Do you want to sleep over?”
Her ears perked, she yipped once, and then she spun around on the stairs.
“That’s not the potty dance, is it?” I asked Ford. “I don’t have enough paper towels for this.”
“I’m sure it will be fine.” He backed down a step, then another. “I’ll just leave you ladies to it.”
“Chicken,” I growled, which earned him a dirty look from Bonnie.
“Bawk, bawk.” He winked at me. “Night, darlin’.”
“Come on.” I pivoted on the stairs and started climbing. “I’m beat.”
On the landing, I held the door for Bonnie and showed her into my apartment. I worried I might have to fight her for my futon, but she curled up on the mountain of scraps and half-sewn projects Bishop had dumped out of my supply bin during his hunt for sheets. Would it have killed him to steal dirty sheets and a laundry cart? I seriously doubted Bonnie cared if her escape route was springtime fresh.
Sometimes the fact my boss, and therefore Bishop, had access to my place really tweaked my nose, but I had agreed to the terms. I understood why the POA felt I warranted unrestricted access. And, now that I thought about it, maybe that utter lack of privacy was another factor in the absence of any personal life.
Sharing myself with another person was hard enough without turning it into a spectator sport.
“Bathroom’s through that door,” I told Bonnie. “Everything else is in plain sight.”
Her contented huff rustled the cloth beneath her enormous muzzle.
“I have a meeting to attend at dusk, so we’ll have to make arrangements for you then.”
A faint whine whistled through her nose.
“Don’t pout. You’d be bored out of your mind.”
All that was left to do was turn out the light, change into pajamas since I had company, and hope she didn’t snore.
Five
A troupe of chainsaw-juggling lumberjacks woke me ten minutes before my alarm got the chance. Cracking open my eyes, I caught sight of Bonnie, still on four legs, all of which were currently sticking up in the air as she snored louder than some woodchippers.
A firm knock jolted me upright, making me rethink where to cast my blame, but my sleepover buddy kept right on sawing logs. Probably sequoias. A whole forest of them. Into toothpicks.
When I opened the door, I wasn’t all that surprised to find Midas standing in the hall, but I was glad I was decent. The red Star Trek pajama set I got on sale at the mall might not give off a professional vibe, but I was home and off the clock, so he could deal.
“I heard you made a friend.” His gaze slid past my shoulder. “I came to see if you needed anything.”
“Do you mean a harness and a leash?” I covered a yawn with my palm. “Or a crate and newspaper?”
The fine hairs rose down the back of my neck when crimson bled into Midas’s eyes as my joke fell flat.
“Look, I just woke up. As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure you woke me up.” I gave him the stink-eye for that. “I didn’t mean I would cage Bonnie or that she was my pet. I was thinking out loud how to disguise her as a dog, which I can tell by the glowing thing your eyes are doing isn’t working for you.”
A steady rumble filled the space between us, and a wet nose bumped the back of my hand in solidarity as Bonnie sidled up to me, but I shushed her before things got worse.