Part 7
Lily picked up the collar as if it were something wounded.
For a second, neither of us moved. Rain slapped the concrete outside. The stairwell smelled like wet brick, dust, and the sharp metallic scent that comes before summer lightning. Somewhere below, a door banged against its frame.
Then Lily whispered, “No.”
The word broke whatever had frozen me.
I called Ethan before I called anyone else.
He answered on the second ring. “Claire?”
“Judge got out.”
His voice changed immediately. Not louder. Sharper. “Where?”
“Service stairs. Second floor. Storm door was open. His collar came off.”
“I’m coming.”
He did not tell me to calm down, which was good because I might have hated him for it. Within two minutes, he was in the stairwell wearing a rain jacket over a T-shirt, Noah behind him with a flashlight, Peanut tucked against his chest in a towel like an elderly king being evacuated.
Ray appeared at 4B with a cane in one hand and a bag of treats in the other. “Big fella likes turkey, right?”
Lily made a sound that was almost a laugh and almost a sob.
We split up. Noah and Lily checked the rear courtyard and alley, calling Judge’s name with the rising panic of people trying not to panic. Ray stationed himself by the lobby with the treats and a flashlight. Ethan and I searched the basement level, the bike room, the storage hallway, and the narrow passage that led to the trash enclosure behind the building.
Rain soaked through my blouse in under a minute. My careful work shoes slid on wet pavement. I kept seeing Judge in every shadow: under a parked car, beside the dumpster, against the fence. Each time the shape became a box, a trash bag, a coil of hose.
Ethan moved beside me, steady but not slow.
“He may not have gone far,” he said. “Cats usually hide close when they’re scared.”
“He’s not usually scared.”
“He was tonight.”
Because of me. The thought came hard and clean. I had opened the door. I had been distracted. I had been angry at the interruption, angry at work, angry at all the ways my life refused to stay contained.
Lily’s voice carried from the courtyard. “Judge!”
No answer.
Ms. Palmer appeared under the rear awning in a belted raincoat, holding an umbrella with one hand and her phone with the other. Even in a storm, she looked formally disappointed.
“What is going on?” she asked.
“My cat got out,” I said.
Her eyes flicked to Ethan, Noah, Peanut, Ray in the lobby behind us, and Lily searching near the gate. “In this weather?”
“Yes, in this weather.”
Something in my tone must have warned her not to mention policy.
She lowered the umbrella slightly. “I’ll text the first-floor owners. One of them has cameras by the back entrance.”
I stared at her.
“What?” she said. “I dislike violations, Ms. Bennett. I don’t dislike cats.”
That was the first time all night I almost cried.
The camera footage came fifteen minutes later. Judge had slipped through the service door at 10:19 p.m., crossed the small covered area behind the building, then disappeared toward the old storage annex attached to the neighboring property. It had once been part of a bakery, Ethan explained, before the building conversions. Now it was mostly locked space, maintenance equipment, and forgotten things.
“We checked that door,” Noah said. “It’s locked.”
Ethan looked at the video again. “There’s a broken vent panel low on the side wall.”
Ray tapped his cane once. “Peanut’s been sniffing that side of the fence all week.”
At the sound of his name, Peanut lifted his head. He had been trembling under the towel, old and tired from the storm, but now his nose worked the air. He wiggled until Noah set him down.
“Dad,” Noah said, “he’s too tired.”
Peanut ignored him. He pulled toward the gate, tiny paws skidding on wet concrete, making a determined sound somewhere between a whine and a motor. Judge had spent weeks tolerating that dog. Now Peanut seemed to have decided the debt was due.
We followed him.
The storage annex sat behind a rusted chain-link gate, its brick wall slick with rain. The broken vent was barely visible under a warped metal panel. Ethan crouched and shone his flashlight through the gap.
“Judge?” he called softly.
Nothing.
Peanut whined and scratched at the bottom of the door.
Lily sank to her knees beside him. “Please,” she whispered. “Please, Judge.”
The annex door was padlocked, but Ms. Palmer, who had apparently joined the search party permanently, knew the emergency contact for the property manager next door. It took ten more minutes and two calls before we had a code for the lockbox near the alley entrance.
I stood in the rain, listening to Ethan enter numbers into the box, and felt something in me finally give way.
“I can’t do this,” I said.
Ethan paused. “Do what?”
“Need things.” My voice sounded raw, unfamiliar. “People. A cat. A kid who isn’t mine but feels like mine right now. You. This. I can’t make room for all of it and still be okay if it leaves.”
He looked at me through the rain, his face unreadable for one breath.
Then he said, “Claire, the room is already made.”
The lockbox clicked open.
Inside was a key.
Ethan unlocked the annex door and pulled it toward him. The smell of old wood, damp cardboard, and dust rolled out into the storm. His flashlight cut across shelves, broken crates, paint cans, and stacked folding chairs.
At first, I saw nothing.
Then Peanut barked once, sharp and whole.
From the back corner came a low, familiar growl.
Ethan’s flashlight shifted.
Two green eyes shone from beneath a collapsed workbench…
To read the rest of the story – CLICK the NEXT button 👇👇👇