Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 69807 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 349(@200wpm)___ 279(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69807 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 349(@200wpm)___ 279(@250wpm)___ 233(@300wpm)
However, he hadn’t given me any indication that we were more.
Which meant I shouldn’t have such a high amount of anger swirling through my blood right now.
“It just smells so good!” the woman continued as if I wasn’t about to break her in half over my knee.
“I…”
“It’s called leave him the fuck cologne,” I snarled. “Stop touching him.”
I hadn’t been aware that I’d even moved.
One second, I was writing a review about sanitizing instruments, and the next I was standing next to the woman pointing my finger in her face.
Chevy’s eyes were sparkling as he looked down at me.
Still no expression on his handsome face, but his eyes were all the encouragement that I needed.
“Well, I never…” The woman took a step back from my finger.
I turned, giving the woman my back, and caught Chevy by the lapels of his cut.
Pulling him down to me, I said, “That was uncalled for.”
I finally got a small smile.
My grumpy man, with his perpetual scowl, thawed as he came down to place his mouth on mine. “Are you ready to go home?”
I wilted. “I thought you’d never ask.”
When we got back to my place, I stuck my key in the door, only for it to turn in my hand.
Silver was standing there eating an ice cream bar, staring at the two of us. “Where have you been?”
I blinked. “At that fundraiser for the club. Why are you here?”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m here to go with you to the bank. We had a date.”
I heard Chevy growl in frustration from behind me.
I grinned, because the entire way home, I’d been teasing him with my hand.
He’d tortured me all night long, so it seemed only fitting that I’d torture him back for the thirty-minute ride home.
I looked at my watch. “They’re about to close.”
“I know, so let’s go,” she urged.
I looked at Chevy, and he shook his head. “Go.”
I grinned and patted him on the chest, but my eyes promised him more later if he was patient.
He winked and said, “Since you’re heading to the bank, I’m going to go to my place and grab some clothes.”
His phone rang, and he answered it before I could reply.
Something swift came over his face as he said, “I’ll be there in fifteen.”
I raised a brow at him, and he said, “I’ll be here later. Don’t wait up for me.”
I sighed as I watched him walk away.
“More time for us,” Silver chirped. “Come on. Let’s go. This is so exciting!”
We made it to the bank in the Walmart in time to get my bank account opened.
I also got a brand-new Yeti cooler because I had been the 1000th customer to come in that month to open a bank account.
Yeti cooler and new debit card in hand, I made my way out to Silver’s car and stuffed the huge cooler into her back seat. When I reached for my phone to snap a picture, I realized I didn’t have it on me.
“Oh, I left my phone there. I’ll be right back,” I said as I rushed toward the building.
The woman who’d helped us was just locking up, and I said, “Oh, ma’am. I left my phone on your desk.”
She turned around with a smile and said, “Come on in. Let’s go…” Her voice trailed off and I looked up, following her gaze to a masked gunman standing there with a gun pointed at me.
I blinked.
Then pain exploded in my face, and I fell to the floor.
A tortured scream came from somewhere in front of me, but I was too focused on my pain to care.
Twenty-Five
Them: You have no dignity. Me: It’s pronounced diggity.
—Text from Aella to Chevy
CHEVY
“You’re going to have to repeat that.”
Apollo did, this time a little less detailed, and then stared at me.
“They put a hit out on Aella, and every other person in that room’s significant other, because we killed his kid?” I asked, repeating myself for the third time.
Apollo was probably frustrated with me.
“Yes,” he answered. “I’ve been scouring the dark web for the last half hour, and at least two people picked up the contract before I was able to have it removed.”
Nausea churned in my gut as I stared blankly at the tabletop in front of me.
When Apollo had called me to get over to his place as soon as possible, I’d been thinking that there was something going on concerning himself.
I hadn’t expected this.
“I gotta go,” I said as I stood.
My phone rang just as I stood.
Silver.
Again with the nausea.
“Hello?” I answered hesitantly.
There was sniffling and then a distraught voice croaked, “Hey, um, Chevy. This is Silver. You need to get to the hospital.”
Thousands of possibilities raced through my brain, and every single one of them was horrible.
My stomach sank. “What happened?”
There was a long pause and then Silver said, “Someone shot Aella.”