Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 129460 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 647(@200wpm)___ 518(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 129460 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 647(@200wpm)___ 518(@250wpm)___ 432(@300wpm)
“He won’t go far,” he announces, his deep voice gurgling since his nuts are still sitting in his throat.
“I know,” I assure him, my tone somewhat bitchy. It is annoying thinking you know everything about someone but constantly double guessing yourself since your facts are merely hunches. “But I’m still worried. He—” I stop before I say too much. Caleb’s secrets aren’t mine to share, and in all honesty, I don’t know them all. I have an inkling as to what happened to him, but no one can fully understand someone’s nightmares until they’re thrust into the dark with them.
My father’s protectiveness when I was a child was almost overbearing—hence me moving to Seattle—but it meant I was never hurt like Caleb. Although appreciative of that, it is also frustrating because I will never fully understand what demons he faces when his past crashes back into him.
However, I can be there to support him. He just needs to let me in.
“Pass me your cell.” When the man with orange hair and a blond beard does as asked, I punch my number into his phone. “Please call me if you see him.” I hand him back his phone before issuing a warning, “But I’d advise against approaching him.” I nudge my head to the crotch of his pants. “Or that will seem like child’s play.”
I almost skip away, my pride that I can stand up for myself only faltering when my eyes lock in on a van parked half a block away. Its company logo matches the one on the vase my flowers were delivered in.
“How wealthy must a gift giver be to have flowers delivered at this hour?”
The stranger I’ve not yet been formally introduced to even with regions of our bodies becoming friendly startles me when he asks, “What is it?” I didn’t hear him leave his car, much less creep up behind me.
After swallowing away the unease burning the back of my throat, I nudge my head to the man exiting my building. “That’s the florist who delivered my flowers on Thursday.”
“The flowers you thought Caleb sent you?”
My eyes snap to the stranger so fast my vision blurs. “Caleb didn’t send them?”
Flecks of blond glimmer in the overhead lighting when he shakes his head. “It’s how we unearthed someone was trying to force you to breach your NDA with Seattle Socialites. They were after both you and Jack.”
When the florist grins like he just received the biggest tip of his life, Jack’s security officer pulls something out of the breast pocket of his suit jacket then cautiously approaches him.
I shadow his steps, and an appreciation for my nosiness bombards me when the florist recognizes me. “Good morning, Jessie. Are you enjoying your arrangement?”
He smiles when I reply, “I would appreciate it better if I knew who they were really from. The delivery docket didn’t match the payment processing name.”
He smiles like a love-sick romantic. “Ah… but wouldn’t that ruin the element of surprise?”
I don’t know what the man flashes at the florist when he says, “Not when it involves charges of stalking, intent to commit a crime, and fraudulent activities.” But whatever it is, it gets the chirpy man talking.
“I have the original order slip here somewhere.” He digs through an expandable plastic folder on the passenger seat of his van for thirty long seconds before saying, “Here it is.” His brows furrow before his eyes drop to the clipboard in his hand. “Hmm… that’s weird. The deliveries were ordered by the same man.” He peers at me apologetically while saying, “However, this delivery was for another lady in the building. Octavia—”
“Henslee,” the mystery stranger and I say at the same time before he adds to his reply, “Who ordered the flowers?”
The florist checks his slip again. “Silas—”
I sprint for my building before all of Silas’s name leaves the florist’s mouth. He’s the man who requested we meet earlier this week, the misogynist prick who told me he had the story of the century then fed me nothing but malicious intent to commit a crime.
He was horrid, and just the thought of him confronting Octavia with the horrendous things he told me has my legs moving a million miles an hour.
I reach the door of my lobby when the florist doubles the length of my strides. “He could still be inside. He requested to deliver the flowers himself.”
The man I kneed in the balls almost overtakes me on the third level of my building, but years of track pay off. I stay in the lead, my pace only slowing when I spot Caleb guiding a bleeding and partially undressed Jack down the stairs separating our apartments.
“What happened?”
It is obvious Caleb is still in the grips of his despair when he mumbles, “I don’t know. He beat the shit out of someone.” A stream of light breaks through the blackness when he locks his eyes with the unknown man and murmurs, “Help me get him into Jess’s apartment. The police are right outside.”