“Busy day,” she said. “The natives were restless. I had to deal with three homicides. What’s your excuse for coming in at this hour?”
He shrugged, coming to stand by her. “I don’t have one. I come home whenever the mood hits.”
She nodded. “The life of a CEO.”
Roland thought she sounded like Striker, Quasar and Stonewall. They felt that he needed to do a better job balancing his work life and social life. What social life? He didn’t have one and didn’t want one.
“Were the detectives able to uncover any significant leads?” he asked. Back when he’d been a cop, he’d had aspirations of becoming a detective. A part of him still believed he’d have made a good one.
“Only one out of the three. The other two were pretty complicated. One was a staged suicide and the other, a drug-related execution. Joy and her team will have their hands full solving them, but I’m sure they’ll do it.”
When the elevator arrived, he held it open while she stepped on and then he joined her. He watched as she inserted her key card into the slot, then he moved to lean against the panel wall, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans.
When she turned back to him, their gazes held once again as the elevator door closed and began moving upward. Unable to take much more, he broke eye contact and slid his phone out of his pocket to check his messages.
A few moments later, he glanced back at her and saw she was staring at the side panel wall, as if intentionallynot looking at him. He studied her profile--he had a feeling she wasn’t even aware of just how beautiful she was. Then again, maybe she did, since he’d seen the men at police headquarters routinely drool whenever they saw her.
As if she felt his gaze on her, she looked up and caught him staring. “How was your day, Roland?”
He liked how she said his name and swallowed the knot in his throat before saying, “From the sound of it, not as busy as yours. The assignments were steady, but nothing we couldn’t handle.”
The elevator stopped and when the door opened, she said, “This is our floor.”
“Yes, it is.” Deciding not to walk behind her, or else his eyes would be glued to the sway of her hips, he stepped over beside her, trying not to notice just how in sync their steps were.
“What’s with the bookcase out here in the lobby?” he asked. He’d wondered about it the day he moved in.
She smiled. “Aggie, the woman who lived in your condo when I moved in, loved to read as much as I did, and we discovered we had the same taste in books. So, we decided to start our own personal library. That way, we wouldn’t buy the same books.”
“I see.” Personally, he thought it made the area appear much too cozy for his taste.
When she reached her door, she called out, “Roland, I almost forgot. I need your phone number. And you should have mine.”
He stopped walking and glanced over at her. “Why do you need my number?”
“You never know when we might need each other.”
He stopped himself from saying it was unlikely he’d ever need her and couldn’t imagine a time she might need him. So why exchange numbers?
When he didn’t readily rattle his number off to her, the way she obviously assumed he would, her brows raised. Brows that were shaped perfectly for her face…even when she was frowning, which she was now doing.
“I assure you, I’m not asking for your phone number for personal reasons, Roland,” she said, her tone sharp. “But we’re neighbors and it just makes sense. You never know when something might happen. When the Perkins lived there, we exchanged contact information. I even had Richard’s phone number.”
“Richard?”
“Yes, he’s the older gentleman you bought your condo from.”
“I didn’t buy the condo. I’m leasing it.”
She lifted a surprised brow. “You are?”
“Yes. The person who bought it from that Richard guy only wanted an investment. He’s a client of mine, and so I’m leasing it from him.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll be seeing you, Lennox,” he said, continuing to his door. But he waited to go in until after he’d heard her close and lock hers.
LENNOX ENTERED HER CONDOthen released a frustrated sigh. Roland Summers had a lot of nerve, thinking she wanted his phone number for anything other than contact information in case of an emergency. Typically, that’s what neighbors did. Undoubtedly, he didn’t think so. And still, even after she’d explained why she’d asked for it, he still hadn’t told her.