Total pages in book: 235
Estimated words: 224334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1122(@200wpm)___ 897(@250wpm)___ 748(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 224334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1122(@200wpm)___ 897(@250wpm)___ 748(@300wpm)
“Exactly.” I slap some cash on the counter. “Can you take them over now?” I flash another twenty at her and she beams at me. “Thanks.” I leave the florist and head back to my car, slipping in and pulling off.
But I slam on my brakes toward the end of the road when I look up to my rearview mirror and see a woman crossing. “What?” I whisper, blindly reaching for my door handle and opening, my eyes fixed on her, following her to the other side of the street. I jump out and run after her, my heart going crazy in my chest as I dodge cars and people, my eyes never leaving her back. I reach out, closing in, grabbing her arm, and she swings around on a gasp.
I drop her and step back as she looks me up and down. “Can I help you?” she asks, moving back too, out of the reach of the crazy man.
Jesus fucking Christ, what the hell is wrong with me? I shake my head, my eyes dropping to my Grensons and darting. “I’m sorry, I thought you were someone else.”
I quickly turn and head back to my car before she can scream for help, rubbing at my stomach, laughing lightly at myself. I really am losing my fucking mind.
Beep!
I follow the sound of the angry horn, seeing a cabbie pulling out and around my abandoned car, shouting some unpleasant shit at me as he passes. It goes way over my head. I look back over my shoulder, shuddering. I would say I need a drink but . . .
Yeah. Can’t do that.
21
I sit at my desk, haunted, unable to shake away the unrest inside. It wasn’t her. Just my mind playing games on me. It isn’t the first time, and I expect while I’m sober it won’t be the last. Can’t say I’m a fan.
I look up when Sarah walks in, her heels slowing to a stop when she sees me at my desk. “Okay?” she asks.
“Yeah.” I get up and wander over to the drinks cabinet. I stop when I realize I’m working on autopilot, out of habit and nothing more. I stare at the bottles. Bend and open the fridge, pulling out a bottle of water. I twist the cap off, holding my breath through the discomfort in my hand. “I thought I saw someone today,” I blurt out, needing to get it off my chest. Unlucky for me, I don’t have many people to vent to and Sarah . . . knows. “Twice, actually.”
“Who?”
I turn to face her, and she withdraws, her face an unusual shade of alarmed. “You couldn’t have.”
“I know,” I agree, laughing a little. “The second time, I approached her.” Or chased her. “It wasn’t her at all, just some poor woman with blond hair.” I swig some of the water. “I feel like I’m going crazy.”
“Well, that’s confirmed, Jesse,” Sarah says, watching me head back to my desk. She points a look at my hand. “Did you and Ava fix things?”
Why is she asking? She doesn’t care. I rest my head back. “What did you want, anyway?”
She sighs, loud and meant to be heard, going to the fridge and the pulling some ice from the compartment at the top, banging it into a napkin and bringing it over. She puts it on my hand, and I smile mildly, silently thanking her. “I have some early meetings tomorrow with suppliers.”
“And?”
“I’d appreciate it if you could be there.”
“Why?”
She sighs. “The supplies for the new rooms, when they’re done, are double what we paid last time.”
With such emphasis on when. But she has a point. The whole project is stalled because my girlfriend can’t bring herself to face my business. I need to fix that. We have endless members waiting with anticipation for the new wing to be complete, and after the police raid recently, keeping members sweet is quite crucial. “Why are they double?”
“All I keep hearing about is inflation and—”
“Find another supplier.”
“I have.”
I keep my head back. “And?”
“They’re a bit . . . fluffy.”
“I hate fluffy.”
“I know.” Something slaps on my desk and I peek down at it. “The catalogue of fluff.”
I reach for the first page and open it, giving the model who looks like a cheap version of our very own in-house dominatrix a dubious look. “Nice.”
“Terrible, I know.” Sarah plops into the chair opposite me. “Look, I know you’re turning all vanilla on us lately and have better things to do than buy stock for your elite sex club, like stalk the young interior designer”—she gives me a sardonic smile, and I give her a curled lip—“but this is important. High membership fees demand quality, non-fluffy equipment. Members don’t want cheesy fluff, Jesse. They want quality. It’s like putting a stud up against a donkey.”