Nightwatcher (Nightwatcher #1)(15)

But a burglar wouldn’t linger.

She steps closer and it takes her a moment to place the man’s familiar face: Mack, who moved in across the hall from her a few months ago after Mrs. Ogden died.

“You okay there?” he asks.

“Oh, I totally planned that. It’s part of my new workout routine.”

He laughs. “Seriously—are you all right?”

“I’m fine, thanks.” Embarrassed, and hoping he doesn’t think she’s drunk—is she drunk?—she tilts her open handbag toward a streetlight’s glow, still fumbling for her keys.

On the steps, Mack flicks a lighter, and she looks over to see him with a cigarette between his lips. It surprises her, for some reason—and so does the fact that he’s wearing a pair of threadbare faded jeans with flip-flops and an ancient-looking Bon Jovi concert T-shirt.

He’s always struck her as a clean-cut, button-down type—the kind of guy who, if he even drinks, prefers Bud to bourbon. And probably in a nice glass mug, too, as opposed to straight from the bottle.

Noticing her taking it all in, he holds up a pack of cigarettes.

Well, well, well—a Marlboro man.

“Want one?” he asks.

Desperately.

But she shakes her head. “I quit a few years ago.”

“Yeah. Me too. Not that long ago, but . . .”

She contemplates that—along with his clothing and the reckless note in his voice. “Um, are you okay?”

He doesn’t answer her at first, just exhales a cloud of smoke. Then he says, “Sure.”

“Really?”

Ignoring that, he says, “Kind of late to be coming from work, don’t you think?”

“I was at a party.”

“Did you have a good time?”

“Definitely.”

“What kind of party was it?”

Surprised that he’d even care, she tells him about it as he sits and smokes and nods, with apparent interest in his green eyes. Too light to be Nebraska-field green, but not money green, either. So different from Bill, the seemingly self-absorbed guy whose cab she shared earlier tonight. His business card is somewhere in the bottom of her purse—hopefully along with her keys.

Too bad Mack is married, she finds herself thinking.

But that doesn’t mean he can’t become a friend. A nice, normal friend, as opposed to the over-the-top, self-absorbed fashionistas she’s met through her job.

That’s what’s missing in her life in New York. Normal friends, the kind of people she can really talk to. Few people here even know about her troubled small-town past—not because she’s unwilling to tell, but because she hasn’t come across many people who’d think to ask. Not even Kristina. She talks a lot, but doesn’t ask questions.

Maybe I don’t ask enough, either, Allison thinks.

Funny how she assumed, until tonight, that she knew everything about this guy, and it turns out she doesn’t know anything at all, really. Not even his first name—assuming Mack is an abbreviation for his last—or where he works.

Now who’s self-absorbed?

To be fair, she’s never had much opportunity to find out, since she’s only ever spoken to him in passing. Same with his wife—although she knows that Carrie is an executive assistant at a global financial firm called Cantor-something. Allison always remembers the first part of the name, because it makes her think about horses and, by association, Nebraska.

“It’s spelled differently,” Carrie said when Allison mentioned the horse connection to her one day not long ago, and Carrie shook her head. “It’s Cantor—with an O. Not canter, with an E.”

“No, I know, but they sound the same.”

“But they’re not,” Carrie snapped.

Wow—someone has major PMS today, Allison remembers thinking.

Carrie always struck her as one of those hyper-efficient women who is perpetually preoccupied and ready to move on to the next thing. Not unfriendly, just . . . busy. Lately, though, she seems to have developed a hint of malcontent.

Maybe that’s why her husband is out here in the middle of the night, alone, smoking.

“Mack, can I ask—what’s your name?” Allison blurts out.

He raises an eyebrow at her. “Uh—it’s Mack. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“No, I mean—that’s short for MacKenna, right?” At his nod, she goes on, “I just wondered what your first name is.”

“James. My father was in the music industry—he worked for a record label—and my mother thought it would be cute to name me Jimmy Mack—you know, after the song. It was really popular the year I was born.”

“Which was . . . ?”

He grins. “I’m not telling. Look it up. Martha and the Vandellas.”

“I will.” She pauses. “So everyone called you Jimmy Mack?”

“No one did, thank God. Not even my mother. My family called me Jimmy until I started school, and then there were four other kids with that name in my kindergarten class.”

“Guess it was popular.”

“Still is. How many Jimmys, Jims, and Jameses do you know?”

She thinks about it. “A bunch.”

“Exactly. That’s why everyone’s called me Mack all these years.” He takes a drag on his cigarette.