The Marine Next Door. Julie Miller

touched his mother’s arm. “Is it from—?”

      “Go inside.”

      “But—”

      “Go.” She snapped out of her fixated shock and whisked his cap off his head to press a kiss there before reaching over him to open the door. “There’s a snack in the fridge to hold you until dinner.”

      But Travis, his expression looking oddly mature for one so young, seemed reluctant to leave her. “I was just joking about that movie, Mom. I didn’t think you were really going to get cut in half.”

      John nudged open his own door, giving them some privacy while his neighbor summoned a smile for her son. “I know, sweetie. I know. Wait for me to go through the mail and check the answering machine, though, okay? Now go.”

      John’s muscles were weary with the exertion of the move and their great escape from the elevator as he set the boxes on the carpet. Yet when he turned to close the door, everything in him tensed with guarded apprehension. She was there, standing in the open door frame, the note wadded in her left hand while her right hovered near the gun on her hip again.

      The warm smile she’d given her son had vanished. “Did you see anyone out here?” she asked. “A man who might have left this note?”

      “No.” He was vaguely irritated that she seemed to be sizing him up again. Yeah, those green eyes had noticed the fake leg. They swept over the scars. He bristled under her scrutiny. Did she suspect him of tacking the paper to her door? “What’s it say?”

      “Is this your first trip up from the garage?”

      He took a step toward her. This was his apartment after all. She was the uninvited guest. “My sixth or seventh. What’s in the note?”

      She braced her feet in an overtly defensive stance and he stopped. What the hell?

      John backed up a step and her words came spilling out. “Was there anyone on the elevator with you during any of those trips? Maybe you saw someone in the parking garage you didn’t recognize? Was there anyone messing with the wires or controls on that elevator? Or flowers—did you see anyone trying to deliver flowers?” She glanced around at the closed doors behind her. “Sometimes the florist will deliver them to someone else if I’m not at home.”

      “I didn’t see anyone tampering with anything, I don’t know anybody here. And I sure as hell didn’t get any flowers.”

      “Did you see a guy with a shaved head and tattoos?”

      “I’ve only met the super, Joe Standage.” And the older man wasn’t the shaved-head type.

      “His hair used to be black. Sometimes he dyes it.”

      “Joe does?”

      “No, my …” Her freckled skin suddenly flooded with heat. Was she embarrassed by her ranting? Intimidated by his unapologetic scrutiny? Alarmed to suddenly realize she was the intruder here?

      “Is this how you welcome all your new neighbors, Sergeant—” he dropped his gaze to the name badge on her chest pocket, pulled taut by the Kevlar she wore beneath her uniform “—Wheeler? Blow hot, blow cold? Make nice and then freak out? We haven’t even been properly introduced.”

      Whatever this woman’s secrets were, she wasn’t telling. Instead of answering his accusation, she stuffed the note into her uniform slacks pocket. Then she huffed up in all her warrior Amazon glory, tipping her chin as her skin cooled to peachy dots over alabaster. “I’m Maggie Wheeler. Travis is my son.”

      “John Murdock.”

      “Are you military or KCFD?” She eyed the Corps logo on his T-shirt and the jarhead cut that he wore whether he was overseas with his Reserve unit or home in Kansas City, working for the fire department.

      “Both. USMC, retired. For about a week now. Moving back to town after my last tour and some rehab. Firefighting is the job I’m coming back to after serving my stint in the Corps.” He made another stab at moving closer. “Sarge, um, Maggie … are you okay?”

      Her eyes widened as though the question had startled her. Or maybe it was his advance. Before she answered, she retreated into the hallway. “Of course I’m okay. Thank you for serving our country—Captain Murdock, was it?”

      “Just John now.”

      She nodded. “I apologize for Travis being so nosy. He’s going through a phase where he’s completely nuts about baseball and firefighters and … everything. And he’s never been shy about speaking his mind.” She barely paused for a breath. “I’m sorry I freaked out on the elevator. And the note. It’s just that I … Like I said, it was a rough day. Well, you don’t need to know that. Welcome to The Corsican, John.”

      Yep, that sounded sincere.

      By the time John reached the door, Maggie Wheeler’s was closing. He heard not one, not two, but three separate locks sliding into place.

      Something about that message, or the person who’d left it, had his neighbor spooked even more than getting stranded on the elevator had. Even though she wore a gun and a vest and sergeant’s stripes, indicating she was no rookie when it came to law enforcement, the woman was spooked.

      John narrowed his gaze and looked up and down the hallway. Beyond the super checking him in this morning, and the curious person from the apartment down the hall who hadn’t spoken, he hadn’t seen a single soul out here all day long. A familiar niggle of unease crept along the back of his neck like when he’d sensed a sniper’s rifle focused on him up in the Afghan mountains.

      He shook off the hyperawareness and retreated into his apartment. Afghanistan was seven thousand miles away. His years of service were done and he was reporting back to KCFD Station 23 this week to start his new job as an arson investigator assigned to the ladder company with whom he’d once fought fires.

      He had plenty on his plate right now to deal with. Leggy redheads and curious kids and somebody else’s bad news weren’t his concern tonight.

      John locked the door behind him and leaned back against it, sweeping his gaze across the beige apartment decorated in wrapped furniture and sealed boxes.

      So this was where he was going to live now.

      It beat the cot and caves and blood he’d left in the Middle East. It beat the VA hospital and physical therapy units where he’d learned how to walk again.

      But with nothing but bare walls and the paranoid lady cop next door, the jury was out on whether he’d call this new place home.