“Ms. Voss, I think you may know why we’re here.”
“No,” I said. “I really don’t.”
His expression turned more serious. “Then we need to talk.”
For illustrative purposes only
Bennett
My name is Mara Voss. I’m thirty three, and until that weekend, I genuinely believed I was careful about who I trusted. I don’t hand strangers keys to my home. I lock my doors at night. I check reviews before hiring anyone, and I never post online when I’m traveling.
But Bennett Crowe wasn’t a stranger. He’d lived next door for almost two years. We weren’t close enough to share dinners or personal problems, but we were friendly in the ordinary neighborly way. He waved when he collected his mail. Once, during a bad storm, he’d hauled my trash cans into the garage before they blew halfway down the street. When my kitchen pipe sprang a leak, he gave me the number for a plumber who charged half what the first company had quoted me. He returned every tool I ever lent him in better shape than when he borrowed it.
Bennett was quiet, tidy, almost painfully polite. That’s exactly why I didn’t feel a flicker of fear when he showed up at my door on Friday afternoon, right as I was zipping my overnight bag.
“Sorry to bother you,” he said. “Can I ask a strange favor?”
He stood there with both hands stuffed in the pockets of his gray jacket, his eyes flicking briefly toward the side gate. “My brother’s birthday is tomorrow. My place is too small for everyone, especially the yard. I heard you mention you’d be at your mother’s.”
“You want to use my backyard?”
“Just Saturday afternoon. Food, maybe some music, nothing loud.”
I hesitated. That yard was the whole reason I’d bought this house in the first place. The house itself was small and needed work, but the backyard caught the afternoon sun perfectly. After my divorce, I’d spent most evenings out there planting flowers, because I needed something in my life that got healthier the more I cared for it.
Bennett followed my gaze toward the flower beds. “I’ll keep everyone away from the plants,” he promised. “When you come home, you won’t even know we were there.”
“And nobody goes inside my house.”
“Absolutely not.”
He seemed nervous, but I read it as simple embarrassment over asking a favor. I handed him the key. His fingers closed around it fast.
