SOMEONE BESIDE ME

After that Tuesday, I began noticing things I had previously found convenient to ignore.

Emma sometimes stumbled when she stood too quickly. Her hands shook when she lifted the heavier laundry baskets. If she thought the corridor was empty, she rested her shoulder against the wall and closed her eyes for a few seconds.

The first time I caught her, she straightened before I could speak.

"Something wrong?"

"No."

"You were leaning against the wall."

"It's a sturdy wall."

"That wasn't a question about construction."

She shifted the basket against her hip.

"I'm tired. I'll finish the towels."

"There's a cart for those."

"Mrs. Alvarez already told me."

"Then use it."

"I will."

She waited for me to move out of the doorway. When I didn't, she looked down at the wheels and then back at my face.

"Unless you want to deliver them yourself."

I moved.

She went past me with a quiet thank-you that somehow felt more impertinent than the rest of the conversation.

I called maintenance the following morning and told them to put another laundry cart on the third floor.

Luke happened to be in the study.

"Problem with the old one?"

"It wasn't where it was needed."

"A logistical emergency."

"Do you want to discuss warehouse access or housekeeping?"

"Warehouse access," he said, grinning as he opened his folder.

I allowed him exactly one grin.

Emma began using the new cart. She said nothing about it. I preferred that, though I occasionally wondered whether she'd guessed.

Her shift followed a schedule. Study, library, corridor, linen room, unused guest bathroom. I became familiar with it for reasons that had nothing to do with running a criminal organization.

If she was late, I noticed.

If someone else brought my water, I asked where the cleaner was.

If she passed without stopping, I found something wrong with the room.

One night she stood in the library doorway and looked at the perfectly aligned books I'd told her were crooked.

"Which ones?"

"The end shelf."

She walked over and examined it.

"These?"

"Yes."

She moved a book less than an inch.

"Better?"

"Marginally."

She turned, folded her arms, and studied me.

"You could just say you want company."

The room went still.

"Don't flatter yourself."

"I wasn't. Company could mean Mrs. Alvarez. Or Luke. Or a television."

"I have work."

"Then I'll leave you to it."

She picked up her cloth.

"The chair by the window needs dusting," I said.

"I did that yesterday."

"There's dust today."

Emma looked at the chair. Then she looked at me again.

She sat in it.

"Five minutes. Then I have to do the bathroom."

I should have objected to an employee deciding how long she would stay in my room. Instead, I turned the screen slightly away so the light wouldn't shine in her eyes.

"Long day?"

"A customer sent back pancakes because they tasted like pancakes."

"What did she expect?"

"I didn't ask. I needed the tip."

"Did she leave one?"

"Eighty cents."

I looked at her.

"For how much work?"

"Enough that I'm trying to forget it."

I considered asking for the diner's name. She must have seen something on my face, because she shook her head.

"You can't send people to threaten someone over eighty cents."

"I didn't say I would."

"You looked very thoughtful."

"I'm a thoughtful man."

Her mouth curved.

It wasn't a large smile. I found myself looking at it anyway.

She stayed six minutes. I knew because I checked the clock after she left, which was a humiliating thing to realize about myself.

The following evening, she dropped a folded sheet.

It was nothing. The fabric slid from the cart, and she bent to retrieve it. But when she straightened, her hand went to the wall again.

I moved closer.

"Sit down."

"I'm fine."

"You look like you're about to fall."

"Then stop distracting me."

Her voice lacked its usual steadiness.

I caught the edge of the cart and pulled it toward her so she could lean on it instead of the wall.

"When did you last sleep?"

"This afternoon."

"For how long?"

"Long enough."

"That's an answer people give when the answer is inconvenient."

She looked at me, then down the corridor.

"My mother had a difficult morning. I went to see her before the diner."

"And afterward?"

"There were phone calls."

I knew enough about phone calls to recognize the ones she meant. Bills. Scheduling. People who could make a poor woman's life harder without ever meeting her.

"Take a break."

"I'm already behind."

"Then finish later."

"The bus doesn't finish later."

There was something brutally practical about that sentence. My entire day could be rearranged by a word. Hers depended on a timetable taped inside a shelter.

"Mrs. Alvarez can arrange a different order for the rooms," I said.

"I'll ask her."

She finally sat on the bench outside the linen room. I stayed beside her, telling myself I was making certain she wouldn't collapse on an expensive floor.

She rubbed her palms over her knees.

"You don't have to watch me."

"I'm not."

"Then what are you looking at?"

"The wall."

She leaned back and closed her eyes.

"It is a sturdy wall."

I laughed before I could prevent it.

She opened one eye.

"There. You can do it."

"Do what?"

"Sound like you live here."

I didn't answer. After a minute, she stood, steadier this time, and finished the linen shelves.

Later that week, pain woke me shortly after midnight.

It was less severe than the Tuesday episode, but enough to make me press the call button. The nurse came, checked what needed checking, and stayed until I told her I wanted quiet.

Emma brought fresh water afterward.

"I heard you were awake."

"Does the whole house receive updates?"

"Only the people carrying glasses."

She adjusted the lamp because its glare was in my face. Then she paused beside the bed.

"Do you want the door open?"

"Closed."

"All right."

"Not locked."

She looked back.

I kept my eyes on the glass.

"The nurse will need to come in."

"Of course."

She closed it gently.

I slept for two hours. When I woke, I saw a thin line of light beneath the door and heard the soft movement of her cart. I went back to sleep without reaching for the button.

That should have told me something.

Instead, I spent the next day in meetings, spoke harshly to a supplier, and pretended my attention wasn't pulled toward the clock as her shift approached.

The night was cold. Rain returned after midnight. My nurse checked on me before her scheduled break, and I told her to leave the lamp off.

I remembered little after that.

A sound in the hallway. Someone saying my name. A hand on my shoulder that I shrugged away because I wanted sleep, or because I didn't want to be seen. I couldn't separate the fragments.

Then warmth.

I woke suddenly in my bedroom.

Someone was lying beside me.

My hand moved toward the weapon beneath my pillow before I looked down—and froze.