Chapter 35
“You sure you can do this?”
“Yes,” I say, my stomach twisting with dread at the thought of speaking to Wyatt on the phone.
Kai said he was going to call me. His shift starts in ten minutes and he still hasn’t called.
I want to be pissed at Kai for forcing Wyatt to quit, but I’m not. How can I be when he was right about him? If anything, I should be grateful. If Kai hadn’t threatened him last night, I’d be forced to work with Wyatt all day and pretend not to know he’s a backstabbing asshole, that he’s been spying on me for Maverick for I don’t know how long.
My hands tremble as I pick up a coffee cup, and I drop it, cringing as it smashes on the tiled floor.
“Fuck this.” Kai crouches to clean up the broken pieces, holding me back when I try to help. “I’m answering the phone when he calls.”
“No.” I shake my head. “I can do it.”
“You can’t spook him,” Damon reminds me. “You need to react how you would react normally. Ask him why he’s quitting. Ask him if everything’s okay.”
“I know, Damon,” I grit out. “I’m not an idiot.”
“I didn’t say you were.” The softness in his tone makes me pause, and I lift my head to look at him. He looks into my eyes. “You don’t have to do this, Hailey.”
I pull my brows in. “He might know something’s up if I let Kai answer my phone for me.”
“He might not,” Wren says, lounging on his favorite couch in the corner with Levi and Callie on either side of him. “Kai’s a protective bastard over you. That’s something he would do.”
Kai shrugs behind me as he tosses the pieces of the broken cup in the trash. “That’s true.”
“But you told him to call her,” Derek says, his arms folded across his chest as he watches us all from his spot in the corner. “She needs to be the one to talk to him. We can’t risk him coming here to tell her himself. I don’t want him anywhere near her.”
“He wouldn’t dare?—”
The door opens, cutting Kai off as James walks inside. “Wyatt’s here.”
Kai growls. “I’m gonna kill him.”
“No,” Damon says. “React how you would react normally,” he reminds him.
“Knocking his teeth out is how I’d normally react.”
“Kai.”
“Damon.”
Exasperated, Damon sighs and drags his hands over his face. “Can I get a coffee please, Hailey?”
“You want a coffee?” I ask. “Has your little brother finally driven you to caffeine?”
He gives me a little smile and a wink and holds up his credit card between two fingers. I shake my head and tell him to put his damn money away. Grateful for the distraction he’s offering me, I turn around and busy myself making him a latte.
“Hey,” Wyatt says as he walks inside.
“Morning, Wy,” I say over my shoulder, my heart pounding. “You want coffee?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Damon nods his approval at me.
Kai glares at the side of Wyatt’s face, and Wyatt side-eyes him, awkwardly stepping around him when Kai makes no move to get out of his way. When Wyatt passes me to get to the kitchen, Kai not so subtly moves with him, making a point to keep his body between mine and Wyatt’s.
After I pass Damon his coffee, Kai wraps his arms around me from behind.
“You’re staying, right?” I whisper, hating the fact that I need him but needing him all the same.
“Baby, I’m never letting you out of my sight again,” he says in my ear.
I chuckle weakly. “You promise?”
“I promise.”