Total pages in book: 30
Estimated words: 28565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 143(@200wpm)___ 114(@250wpm)___ 95(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 28565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 143(@200wpm)___ 114(@250wpm)___ 95(@300wpm)
The big man follows me.
I stop and turn. “Are you going to arrest me?”
“I’m not a cop.”
“Are you going to call the cops on me?”
“No.” He reaches into his back pocket and flicks something white into my palm.
I finger the heavy card stock. “What’s this for?”
“If you want to talk, my number’s there.”
I hand it back. “Keep it. I won’t be using it.”
He doesn’t take it.
With a frustrated sigh, I tuck it into my back pocket. “I don’t know what’s going on here, but I’m a nobody in this city. Can you all let me go back to my nobody life?”
He stares at me and then shakes his head. “I don’t think so.”
Chapter Three
GRIFF
“Iknow you’re bored, but I didn’t realize you were fuck a felon bored.” Weston Evers peers down over his glasses at me.
I don’t ask him how he knows what I’m thinking about. Evers has a weird sixth sense about things. It’s how we made billions—his intuition and my brawn. Ten years later and more money than we know what to do with, Weston Evers is running a private academy. He has a plan for it and not one that I entirely approve of. But the two of us have been watching each other’s backs since we were teens enlisting into the army to get away from a shit childhood. We kept each other alive. Now that our wallets are fat, I’m not going to abandon him.
I stretch my legs out and sink deeper into the camel-colored leather club chair. “We’re running a school for overprivileged teens whose idea of rebellion is stealing test results.” I tap the bottom of my cut crystal snifter onto the manila envelope.
“I think it was a mother who hired your sexy burglar, not a student.”
My burglar is right. Glad he knows that. “If not a mother, who were you trying to catch with your bait? I hope not a student.”
Evers’ mouth twitches. “No, not a student.” He doesn’t elaborate, and I don’t push him. He’ll tell me when he’s ready. “Whatever you want to do with our intruder is fine with me. Police. No police. Just make sure that she stays out of the way. I’ve worked hard to set this mousetrap for one particular mouse.”
He drains his glass and gets up. I wait until he’s at the doorway before saying softly, “Not our intruder.”
Without looking behind me, I can sense he pauses before exiting. “So it’s that way, is it? You knew right away?”
I glance at the envelope of test results and consider the way he’d said “mouse” as if the word was an endearment and not synonym for rodent. “Didn’t you know right away?”
His laugh is a hollow one with more than a little trace of pain. “Right from the moment I saw her.”
Left hanging in the air, unsaid, was that she did not reciprocate. Maybe he doesn’t want to jinx me, but more likely he doesn’t want to admit that the one he wants isn’t waiting upstairs in his bed for him.
“May all our trials end in gold.” I lift my glass.
“At least let us not die before the end,” he replies.
Evers needs to get laid. Me, too, for that matter. My gaze lands on the envelope, and I grin. My long dry spell is about to meet an end. Unlike Evers, I’m not letting my woman get away.
I finish my drink and then gather up my supplies. After I put together the care package, I let myself out of the building where my Ducati awaits. I slip on my helmet and gun the engine. The address of the intruder is in the upper part of the city where the wide paved boulevards and the grassy medians give way to narrow cracked sidewalks, sand, and weeds. The brick buildings have bars on the lower windows, and the graffiti no longer looks like art but random acts of violence.
The apartment complex where she lives is a ten-story one. Next to it is a spare empty lot that no one has bothered to improve. In five years, whoever owns this will sell it for millions, and the building where my intruder lives will be torn down, the tenants kicked out. The price of progress. I cut the motor and kick the stand down. The shiny bike screams “steal me.” Scavengers are probably waiting in the dark shadows. I don’t blame them. It’s how I survived so many years ago. I pull out my wallet and lay five bills on the seat. “I’ll be out in ten minutes. If my bike’s still here and in perfect condition, I’ll double what I’ve put here.” I announce into the darkness.
Tucking the helmet under my arm, I stride toward the door. It’s locked, which is good, but I only have to shake the handle for the bolt to slip out of the inner channel, which is obviously bad. Inside, no lights are on. The landing is barely illuminated by the small amount of moonlight that seeps in through the two long thin sidelights bracketing the door. The stairs are sturdy, though. The police report connected to her name says that she and her brother reside on the eighth floor. No wonder the girl has such a fine ass on her. Climbing eight floors at least once a day is bound to add a little junk to the trunk.