40. Nat

It's been three days and I still haven't been back to my apartment. Max told me he'd organized cleaners and installed a new alarm system, while simultaneously insisting I stay at his place.

I refused. Not because I hate his apartment - I love it there - but because spending so much time with him is making it harder to remain objective. Instead, I'm staying at Jane's place. She's been seeing some guy so half the time she's not there. Not that she minds me being there. She's camped on my sofa often enough.

The fact is I still don't know who Max really is. While I believe his explanation about why that woman tried to kiss him, I haven't plucked up the courage to ask him why he was visiting the mayor's building.

Part of me is afraid he's involved with the mayor's shady business. Despite how amazing he was when we realized my apartment had been broken into, I still don't trust him. Not completely.

I'm not sure I can trust any man.

Maybe I'm broken.

The traffic crawls along as I tap my fingers on the steering wheel, on my way to my Aunt Lucia's for dinner. It's been a while since I visited and I figured I could catch up with Mickey at the same time.

He's been suspiciously quiet lately, which never bodes well. I know he does all kinds of shady things online, mostly hacking into stuff for anyone willing to pay enough crypto. The guy's a fucking crypto millionaire these days. Or so he says.

Not that anyone would know it from the way he lives. The only things he spends his ill-gotten gains on are tech and pizza.

I take a left, toward the neighborhood where Lucia and Mickey live. It's a nice area. Lots of artisan bakeries and coffee shops. Lucia moved here after she and Uncle Ron divorced.

The SUV in my rearview mirror I noticed earlier turns left too.

I always expected Lucia to meet someone else, but she never did. She says she prefers being single and ready to mingle, but we both know it's because she puts Mickey first. Not many men would put up with an adult son living in the basement.

It wouldn't be so bad if Mickey was friendly and sociable, but he's a complete asshole most of the time. He's OK with me and he loves his mom, but with everyone else? Nope.

Lucia has zero chance of meeting a man chilled enough to overlook Mickey's less attractive qualities. It's sad really. She's still gorgeous even though her hair is streaked with gray.

Any guy would be lucky to end up with such an amazing woman. Uncle Ron was an idiot for walking away.

Industrial units and office blocks turn into homes with front yards. I drive slowly through the quiet streets. There's an old truck behind me, some guy playing music while puffing cigarette smoke out of the window, but behind him, I can still see the SUV.

Instead of turning right into Lucia's street, I take a left and then a sharp right past the grocery store. There's a narrow street that runs around the back so I drive my small Fiat down it and parallel park behind some large trash dumpsters.

For ten minutes, I sit there, scrolling through emails and social media notifications. I can't hear any other vehicles, just the sound of music from the pizza shop that backs onto the alleyway.

Some guy comes out with a bag of trash and raises one eyebrow in surprise when he spots my car tucked in next to the dumpster.

"Hey, you OK, lady?" he asks as he drops the bag in the dumpster. The stench is awful and I wrinkle my nose in disgust. Jesus. Is that a fucking rat?

"Hmm yeah, just hiding. I think someone was following me."

He looks alarmed. "Need me to call the cops? Come into the kitchen if you feel unsafe."

I'm probably being paranoid. Pretty sure the restaurant dude thinks I am.

"It's OK, I have to leave now." The guy throws me another concerned look, shrugs, and then disappears back inside.

I carefully ease back out of the alley, trying not to scrape my car on the wall. Once I'm back on the street, I look both ways but there's no sign of the SUV, so I carry on to Lucia's house, watching in the rearview mirror, just in case.

When I arrive, Lucia opens the door beaming with a wide smile. The fragrant scent of garlic and oregano drifts out and I sigh with happiness. Nothing beats my aunt's home cooking. She's a literal angel in the kitchen.

We hug before I follow her inside where Mickey sits at the table, tapping away at his phone. As usual, he ignores me. But that's OK. I know he cares.

"Hey Mickey, how's things?" He looks up from the bank of screens on his wall and grunts a non-reply.

Dinner is over, the dishwasher loaded, and Lucia's caught me up on everything happening in her life.

The small charity she works for has secured funding for a scheme where volunteers visit vulnerable seniors living alone at home. She's busy organizing a rota. I offered to do some of the visits but she refused, saying I'm too busy and she has plenty of names on the list.

It's probably for the best. Given the state of my life right now, the last thing any poor old lady needs is a psycho following me into her house and doing fuck know's what to her.

Not even joking.

Vivid nightmares about red paint that looks like blood dripping down my bedroom wall wake me up most nights. Jane hasn't said anything but I know I've disturbed her a couple of times.

Lucia kissed me goodbye after the kitchen was tidy and disappeared to visit one of her neighbors. She's used to me heading down into the basement to hang with Mickey. It's what I've done for years.

While Mickey might be a grouchy hermit, he doesn't mind my company.

"Did you find anything else out about Uriov?"

"Not much," he admits after a few minutes. "But that site I mentioned has suffered a lot of issues." He snorts. "Someone uploaded a virus and took it down for nearly a week."

"Was it you?" I fix him with a hard stare. Not that I'd be angry if it was. From what he told me before, the site is disgusting.

"No." He mutters that his hacking skills are better and the site would have been down for more than a week if he had, so I believe him.

I don't say anything else for a while and eventually, Mickey reluctantly drags his attention away from his screens to look at me questioningly.

"Can you look into someone else for me?"

There's a faint smirk before he replies. "It'll cost you."

Money means nothing to Mickey. He doesn't care much about material things other than his computers and gaming tech. "Go on…"

To my surprise, he looks slightly embarrassed for a hot minute, and then his usual bored expression returns. "I need some new clothes. Buy me some."

My jaw drops. Mickey lives in joggers and hoodies, whatever the weather.

"Why not ask your mom?"

"Because she'd want to know why and then buy me something fucking lame."

"Sure, I can do that, but why not order some stuff online and get it delivered?"

He looks at like like I'm stupid. "Because I can't buy clothes with Bitcoin and parcels go through Mom." There's a lot of dramatic eye-rolling and huffing.

"OK, fine. Send me links to stuff you like and I'll order it."

"I need a haircut too."

This time curiosity gets the better of me. "You want a haircut?" He hasn't cut his hair in years, despite Lucia nagging him every few months.

Then I see it plain as day. "Oh my god, have you found a girlfriend??"

To my amusement, he flushes red and immediately turns away before grunting,

"No. Don't read anything into it."

Hmm. I'm desperate to know more but pushing him won't achieve much. Mickey tends to shut down once he feels under pressure, and since I need him to do some more research, I have to tread carefully.

"I'll fetch some clippers over in a few days. If you want a decent haircut, I can ask Jane to do it? She's great at cutting hair."

"Jane? Your friend who looks like a pixie?"

"Yeah."

"Maybe." I'll take that as a yes. Jane knows him well enough not to cross his boundaries. She'll also be delighted if Lucia offers to cook for us, which she will if I let her know we're coming over.

Now we've struck a deal, I give him the information he needs to start researching. He writes it down and I leave shortly after.

There's no sign of the SUV or any other suspicious vehicles as I drive back to Jane's apartment. Maybe I was just being paranoid earlier.