"Someone's in the house! Get up." She flipped on the lights and checked the door as Alex scrambled out of bed.
"What? What's the matter? What happened?" He moved toward her, reaching out as if to comfort her, but she swatted him off and worked to get a pair of pants and a shirt on.
"Someone’s in the house! I saw him run to one of the rooms." She raced to the side of the bed with the phone and dropped down. "I'm calling the cops."
"Baby. It was probably a bad—"
"No! I'm serious, and don't you dare go out there. Do you hear me? I'm serious." Tears burned her eyes, and Alex moved to sit down on the bed next to her.
He wrapped his arm around her shoulder and kissed the side of her face as the phone began to ring.
"Nine-one-one. What's your emergency?"
"We have a burglar. He's in the house now. Please, hurry. I've locked myself in the bedroom with my boyfriend, but I saw him running through the house." Jamie spoke frantically, her tone and words blurred due to her crying.
Alex took the phone and got up, walking to the window and speaking calmly with the woman on the phone.
Jamie stood and pressed her hands to her face, trying to shake the fear and trepidation that threatened to strangle her, but she couldn't get past it.
She tensed when Alex wrapped her in a tight hug.
"They're on their way, Jamie. It's going to be fine. We have security cameras. I'll just check it out and we'll see that no one was here." He kissed her head as she jerked her face up.
"Alex. I told you that there have been a handful of houses robbed in our neighborhood. The damn alarm system needs to be fixed. It's not a joke. What if he has a weapon? You wouldn’t be hugging a warm body, but bagging up a cold one. This is serious shit." She moved out of his arms as anger ripped through her, burning up the fear and quickly replacing it. What if they went into Mark’s place first?
"I forgot about the fucking alarm system. Too busy with work. Shit!" He worked to get fully dressed and moved to the closed door.
Jamie's heart constricted in her chest. "What’re you doing?"
"I'm going out to see if he's still here, and to figure out what he stole from us." He glanced back. "Hand me that hammer under my nightstand."
"A hammer? What the hell are you going to do with a hammer?"
"Would you rather I take nothing out there?" He stood to his full height, his attitude showing that he was fully awake, and less than happy.
"No. I'd rather you wait for the cops like any sane individual would." She grabbed the hammer and handed it over as she growled at him.
"There's no one in the house, Jamie. You're being overly sensitive. It was probably the dog." He took the hammer and reached out to touch the side of her face. "Stay here."
"Yep. Just in case the vicious guard dog attacks?"
"Watch it, cheeky girl. I'll get you."
She flopped back down on the bed and curled up into the fetal position. She reached for her cell phone and realized it was still in the kitchen. Damn it! She couldn’t send Mark a warning text. She didn’t know his number by heart and wasn’t about to ask Alex if he knew it. “Get the burglar the hell out of our house now, and get back in bed. I'm scared, and tired as fuck."
He chuckled and rolled his eyes. He grumbled about her being indecisive as he walked out into the hall.
Chapter 13
Three Days Later
Everything settled back down a few days later, thankfully. No one had been in the house when Alex went through it. The police found no signs of a break-in or entry in the house, nor did anything look out of place. However, Jake had been locked in the pantry with a large rawhide bone. It was the only giveaway that someone had been inside. Mark came up to say he hadn’t heard anything, and swore he hadn’t bought the dog the bone. Poor Jak
e looked sad when the police took it away from him. They did notice shoeprints in the snow, that cut across the lawn. The prints belonged to a large male. However, it didn’t prove anything. The police would keep an eye on the house and suggested to Alex that he get his alarm system back up and running.
With the drama of actually having someone break in to the house, all of the heat at the office subsided. Gina was a great help to Alex and Jamie in getting the alarm fixed and trying to have the camera footage reviewed by the investigators with the New York Police Department. They weren’t sure if they would get anything from the cameras because the code wasn’t working at the time. However, the security company Alex had hired seemed to be trying to make up for the fact that the alarm had gone down in the first place, and they hadn’t noticed it on their end.
Alex grew adamant about Jamie going into the office with him after the break-in, and told her she could swim in the pool, he would turn the heat even higher, or she could just work out in the gym. Either way, he made her promise to let Mark know what she would be doing so she was never on her own. It felt a bit restrictive, and getting up at five in the morning was enough to leave her ready to cut someone.