Maureen looked over Kayla’s shoulder and spotted Duncan entering the hallway. “Oh great balls of fire! No, I wouldn’t dare to interrupt, dear. Hello, Duncan. It’s good to find you here.”
Duncan grinned at Maureen. “Only wanted to be closer to you, Maureen. You know how it is.”
She smiled coyly. “Now don’t think you can charm me, Duncan. I have enough on my hands with being friends with your grandfather already.”
Seeing Kayla standing there smiling, he wanted to kiss her so badly. He put his arm around her shoulders and kissed the top of Kayla’s head before turning back to the older woman. “What’s up, Maureen? Pops being grumpy again?”
She chuckled and informed them it was nothing she couldn’t handle. When she turned at the sound of Calum walking up to the door, she burst out with “Good Heavens. I hope this young man is your brother, because Lord knows it would be hard choosing between these boys.”
Kayla laughed at Maureen’s words, and Duncan acted all wounded. “You know you would choose me every day, Maureen. No need to act all coy.”
Calum and Kayla looked alike with their wavy blond hair, slightly freckled noses, and brown eyes. Kayla was a lot smaller than her brother; she was a tiny little thing.
“Well, now that she’s met me, she’ll be giving a different answer, Duncan, I’m sure.” Calum threw a killer smile at Maureen, and Duncan could see her starting to blush.
“Enough already, guys. Please join us, Maureen. Calum always gets too much food, and I’m sure there is enough for the whole building in these bags,” Kayla said, eyeing the four bags of food that Calum brought.
“Of course, you know me, sis. Please join us,” Calum said to Maureen, who nodded and went into the apartment. She walked straight to the pink couch and planted herself as she dropped her purse next to the side of it. Calum followed Maureen and laid the food on the coffee table after he formally introduced himself to her and they’d shaken hands.
“Oh! You’ve brought my favorites from Danny’s. I like you already.” Maureen winked at Calum, and he chuckled while shaking his head. She continued, “It’s so good to meet some of Kayla’s family. I know I shouldn’t say this, but I was a little worried about our girl.”
Kayla smiled when Maureen referred to her as “our girl.” She walked over to the couch and planted a kiss on Maureen’s cheek. Maureen squeaked in surprise but patted Kayla’s head to thank her and tell her without words that she appreciated her loving act.
“Why were you worried, Maureen?” Duncan was curious, as they seemed to be more than neighbors.
“I don’t know if it’s my story to tell, dear.” Maureen looked at Kayla, and when she nodded, Maureen smiled softly and continued. “The first day I met Kayla, she was looking as if she was in pain. Standing halfway in the doorway, she looked like a skittish little kitten who’d been beaten and bruised.”
Duncan noticed Calum clenching his jaw, and he was feeling the same kind of tension coming over his body.
“But at the same time, I detected a powerful tigress, because although she was obviously hurt herself, she still had the guts to open her door and look if she could help some other person in pain. In that moment, I knew she was a fighter, that she couldn’t be stopped.”
Kayla started crying, and Duncan put his arm around her shoulders and kissed her cheek.
“She opened the door, only to find Mister Whisker doing his loud song and dance,” Maureen said, breaking the tension after Kayla started to cry.
“Mister Whisker?” Calum asked.
“Yes, my dear old cat. Deaf as a post, but that doesn’t stop him from meowing. Poor little thing doesn’t know he’s a bit loud.” Maureen whispered the last words as if Mister Whisker could hear her and she didn’t want to hurt his feelings.
Duncan sniggered and said, “A bit loud? The first time I witnessed him screeching, I almost shit my pants.” Kayla laughed wholeheartedly, but Maureen only smiled briefly. Duncan knew Maureen loved Mister Whisker too much to join in on the laughter.
The distinct clearing of a throat brought Duncan back to the situation at hand. “You were beaten and bruised?”
Kayla closed her eyes. “I went out with friends from work on a Thursday. There was one guy who’d started working there a few months before, and he was nice at first, always asking how my day was and offering to get me some coffee.”
Duncan clenched his hands into fists, not wanting to hear Kayla speaking of going out with other guys, but he kept himself in check and gave her shoulder an encouraging squeeze.
“That was all it was in the beginning. But then I started to run into him when I went places with people outside of work, such as my friend Tessa from the gym. I didn’t think much of it at first, but after a while it was too much of a coincidence. I even bumped into him in front of my apartment once on a Sunday. He acted surprised, as if he happened to be in the same building visiting a friend. He was really jumpy and all sweaty. And still, I didn’t realize what was going on. But now that I’m here, all these bump-ins come at me in nightmares, and I know he was a creep who stalked me for several months.
“I kept asking our sisters if they ran into people I knew, as they had met Tom before, but his name never came up. I prayed that he didn’t attack someone else in the meantime, but I was too scared to come out of hiding and search for him to know for sure. I still don’t know how come I didn’t see him for what he is. I’m so stupid,” she sobbed.
Duncan kissed Kayla’s cheek once more and said, “It’s not your fault, Kayla. Stop beating yourself up.”
“What happened that Thursday night?” Calum was a cop, and Duncan recognized so much of him in his own brother Declan. Always ready to get to the facts and moving forward into fixing things.
Duncan felt for Calum. He must’ve been going out of his mind these past weeks, as he knew there was something wrong with his sister, but he couldn’t get her to open up to him. Now she was talking, and it almost seemed that Calum was trying to make the best of the momentum and had to get to the bottom of this before she closed off again.
Kayla took a deep breath and said, “We went out to Loco’s, where they have happy hour at six. We went with several colleagues, men and women. It was nothing out of the ordinary. At around seven, the first of our group went home and another couple of people went over to the pool table, and I was left alone with Tom when my colleague Isabel went to the bathroom. He scooted over to me in the booth, all close and in my personal space. When I tried to put some distance between us, he made a crude remark.”