Chapter 19
FLYNN
Kylie was always a breath of fresh air when she stopped in, and I was thankful for the lunch she brought considering I hadn’t eaten at all that day. Still, something about her being there made me slightly uncomfortable. I couldn’t put my finger on it until Jeff barged into my office.
His brows nearly flew into his perfectly styled hairline as he took in the way Kylie and I sat together on one side of my desk. It was then I realized just how close she was to me. I scooted my chair to the left a bit and sent a pointed look Jeff’s way.
This isn’t what it looks like.
If only he could read my mind. Then again, I didn’t know why I had to justify my actions to my assistant. The only person I would need to do that with was the wife who avoided me. That wasn’t fair, I had been doing my own share of avoidance over the past couple of weeks too. In my defense, I wanted her to have to come to me.
“I was going to ask why you threw your whole Deli lunch away in my trash, but I guess I got my answer,” Jeff announced, and I didn’t miss the tone he took. My assistant was not happy to see me in such an intimate position with a woman who was not my wife. He had been rooting for me to fix things with Courtney, and clearly got the wrong impression about what was happening.
“I didn’t have a deli lunch. I probably would have worked straight through again if Kylie hadn’t brought lunch by, in the hopes of bribing me into a work lunch.”
“What exactly are you working on?” Jeff asked. “Kung Pow and Kisses?”
“Jeff!” His name sounded more like a reprimand. He knew better than to get an attitude with clients.
“What would your wife think if she walked in here and saw how you conduct business?”
“Wife?” Kylie asked.
“That’s about enough,” I growled at my assistant, who apparently had a lightbulb moment as I was about to send him home for the day.
“Oh no!” He called out and then ran from my office. I could feel the panic in his voice and took off after him. When I got to the front desk, it was to see Jeff pull a bag from Court’s favorite deli out of the trash, along with two sodas.
“Where did that come from?” Even as I asked the question, I feared the answer.
“Her name is on the receipt,” Jeff confirmed.
“Fuck.”
“I can only imagine what she saw when she stopped by to bring you lunch. Considering Kylie was about hair’s breadth from crawling into your lap when I walked in.” Again, Jeff’s tone was admonishing at best, downright accusatory would have been a better description.
“Nothing was going on.”
“Nothing to you or would it have looked like something to your wife?”
“Flynn?” I turned to see Kylie headed down the hall toward us. “Did I hear Jeff correctly? He said you were married. Since when?”
“I am married,” I informed her for the first time. It wasn’t because I tried to hide the fact. I simply didn’t think it mattered since I had no interest in Kylie outside of business.
“You’re not wearing a ring.”
“No, I’m not.” I stared down at my hand and remembered that the one thing we hadn’t managed to get done before our wedding was to procure a ring. Like hell was I going to wear the one that had been made for my cousin, even though his mother offered to loan it to me until I could get one of my own.
“That woman earlier,” She whispered.
“What woman?” I already knew who she was talking about, but I hadn’t noticed my wife, and didn’t think Kylie had seen anyone either.
“There was a woman standing outside your office earlier. I saw her briefly and then she disappeared. I thought it was just one of your employees who didn’t want to disturb you, since you had a lunch date.”
“I didn’t have a lunch date,” I snapped.
“No, I guess in your mind, you didn’t.” Kylie agreed. “I’m really sorry. I thought…” She hesitated a moment and then came right out with it. “We’ve worked so well together in the past, and I’ve always admired you. I thought I would take a chance and shoot my shot.”
I stared at her for a moment. It had been completely lost on me that she had been trying to hint at something more than a working relationship between us.
“Seems like you’re still trying to shoot your shot even after finding out that Flynn is married,” Jeff snapped at her. Kylie stepped back and threw her hand over her mouth as she gasped in shock. She had all but forgotten my assistant was there to witness her declare her intentions.
“No, I wouldn’t. Oh my God.” She took off toward the elevator without looking back.
“Fuck!” I yelled as Jeff stood there staring off at the elevator with a sour expression that pulled the corners of his mouth down in a frown.
“I would wish you good luck explaining this to your wife, but I’m not sure you deserve it.”
“I swear to you, everything was innocent on my end,” I told my assistant.
He gave me a look that could be defined as the embodiment of sarcasm before he rolled his eyes at me. “That much was obvious from the sheer obliviousness you exhibited with Kylie just now. I’m not the one you need to convince though.”
Jeff was right. I had some serious work to do to make my wife understand she hadn’t walked in on what she most likely thought she had. I ran back to my office and pulled up the security feed. I emailed the clip of Kylie and me in my office as well as what just went down at the front desk to myself, so I would have it to show Courtney. Then, I went back and watched the video of my wife as she walked off the elevator and came down the hallway. She stood there and watched us for a few minutes before she finally turned to leave with a hurt look on her face.
Dammit, she had been smiling as she approached my office. She was obviously at a turning point, and had come to a decision about things, only for my visit from Kylie to mess it all up before I even knew my wife was there.
I left the office and headed home to go explain things, but when I got there, Courtney wasn’t there. I called, texted, and got no response. The only recourse I had was to suck up my pride and call the people closest to her. I dialed Hadley first, considering that was who my wife ran to last time. As soon as she picked up, she screamed into the phone.
“Fuck you, Robeson. I was on your side but now you can go choke on a disease infected dick!”
“Please, Hadley it wasn’t…” I didn’t get to finish because she hung up on me. I tried to call Reed after that.
“Let me guess,” My father-in-law sighed into the phone. “You lost my daughter again.”
“I know it seems like a habit, but I promise it’s not.”
“See that it doesn’t become one. Two times in as many weeks isn’t a great track record though, Flynn.”
“I understand that. Do you know-”
He cut me off. “Hadley.”
“That was my first call. She told me to choke on a disease infected dick and then hung up.”
Reed whistled down the line. “I don’t know what you did, but good luck with that.” It sounded like he was about to hang up on me too, and then he came back with, “And Flynn, if my daughter needs help to bury a body, it’s nothing personal.” Once that message was delivered, he hung up on me too.
“Fuck!”
I knew, without a doubt, that my wife was with her best friend. As much as I wanted to run to her, apologize, and explain the situation, it felt like the right thing to do was to give her a little time to calm down first. At the very least, I needed enough time to figure out how to get around her bulldog of a best friend because there was no way Hadley would open her door to me if she thought I had been cheating on Courtney.
By the time midnight rolled around, I knew my wife didn’t have any plans to come home. I sent her one more text, just in case she decided to look at it.
Flynn: I’m sorry. As cliche as this sounds, it wasn’t what it looked like. I have video of the office before and after you left, if it makes a difference.I promise you there was nothing going on between me and Kylie. She was there for a work a lunch- at least on my end anyway. Please, come home so I can explain.
Not that I thought I would get one, but after thirty minutes, my text still went unanswered.
Forty-five minutes later, after I’d finally hung Courtney’s canvases in my living room, my cell started to ring. I dove for it and just barely hit the button on the fourth ring.
“Hello?”
At first, I didn’t hear anything other than the din of a bunch of voices and music in the background.
“Hello?” I questioned again. “Courtney?”
“My hubby-and…” I heard her say, but it didn’t sound like she was speaking to me.
“Hey man,” a man’s voice came over the line. “I think I have your wife here. She’s pretty fucked up and lost her friend in the crowd.” My heart pounded erratically in my chest at the thought of how dangerous Courtney’s situation was. She was relying on a strange man for her safety, and didn’t even realize.
“Where are you?” He rattled off a bar name and the relative location. “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Don’t let her out of your sight.”
“No worries, man. If it was my sister or wife, I would hope that someone else would look out for her. I’ll be here and make sure she doesn’t wander.” He chuckled. “Not that it would be possible, she’s practically asleep standing up.”
“Fucking hell,” I murmured into the phone as I grabbed my wallet and keys and headed for my car.
“I’ll stay on the line with you, if it will make you feel better.”
“Yeah, it would. Thanks again for doing this.”
“Like I said, no worries. Happy to help.”
“Id dat my hubby-and?” I heard Courtney slur.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Done fink he likes meh.”
“I promise you that he does,” The man told her.
“Okay,” She drew the word out in what amounted to a long sigh as the stranger who was looking out for her laughed.
“How about you sit down right here, darlin’?”
“Nuf glab a whuff.” Whatever she tried to say was clearly not in English. “Hashes… Haddddd…Had-leeee?”
“ Any clue what all that translates to?” The man asked me.
“Hadley is her best friend, and probably who was with her tonight.”
“Ah, I see. Pretty sure the girl she was with is fucking my friend in the bathroom.”
“Jesus,” I hissed.
“No judgement, man.”
“Let me guess, you were supposed to hookup with my wife?”
“Nah. Not my style. Clocked her ring immediately, and besides, she told me she was married about thirty times before that last shot caught up to her.”
I pulled up into the parking lot of the bar that was in what looked like a mini-strip mall. “Of all the places,” I groaned. It was a fucking biker bar. The man on the phone laughed once again.
“Like I said, no worries, your wife was safe the whole night.”
I walked into the bar and scanned the area. It took a minute, but I finally found her slumped over in a half-sized booth on the back wall. I hung up with the guy who was keeping an eye on her and made my way to them.
He stood as soon as I got to them. “Sorry to worry you with the call, but I know my buddy, and her friend was pretty shitfaced. They’ll be at it all night and her friend won’t remember her until she sobers up some.”
“Thanks. Hadley and I will have a conversation about that shit once she sobers up too. If you don’t mind, could you go get her for me while I get my wife out to the car?”
“I’m not so sure how that will go over,” The man hedged.
“Don’t really care. I appreciate you looking out for my wife, but her friend is my responsibility too. Court would never forgive me if I left Hadley behind, especially if she’s as drunk as you made her sound.”
The man threw his hands up. “I get it, but they made their hookup plans long before the alcohol was involved.”
“They?” I questioned, wondering if Courtney had planned to hookup with someone too.
“My buddy, Trace and your wife’s friend,” He clarified and then smiled a little too sweetly at my woman. “Told you, she informed me - and everyone else who tried to talk to her - the she was a married woman and took those vows seriously.”
I had to smile at that. My beautiful girl was loyal to a fault, even when she thought I wasn’t. That was something we would clear up as soon as she sobered up though. Before we could say anything else, I noticed Hadley stumble out from a hallway toward the opposite corner from the booth. At least she had the presence of mind to look upset when she didn’t immediately see my wife somewhere.
The minute our eyes met, she stumble-ran toward me. “Oh my God! Where is she?”
“She’s fine, she’s safe.” I pointed to the booth where Courtney had slumped all the way over on the seat and started to snore. I grinned down at her and shook my head. “Your friend here took care of her until I could get here.” Even in her inebriated state, Hadley winced at the tone of my voice. “She’s lucky he was a good guy.”
Hadley sniffed and then tears tracked down her face. “I’m so sorry,” She said, but it came out so low, that I almost missed it.
“Come on, man. I’ll help you guys out to your car.”
“Thanks…” I left the gratitude hanging as I waited for him to fill in his name.
“Call me Sparks.”
“Sparks?” I asked.
“Yep.” He tapped the spot over his chest where his name was represented on a patch.
“Thanks again, Sparks. Appreciate you looking out for my woman.”
“I’d say any time, but hopefully, you keep her on a shorter leash next time.” He winked at me to let me know he was teasing, but Hadley must have missed that.
“My friend is snot a dog!” Her words jumbled a bit, but nowhere near as bad as Courtney’s had before she passed out. I lifted my wife into my arms and allowed Sparks to lead the way, so he could open doors for us. When we got to the car, I laid Courtney across the backseat and put Hadley up front with me.
My wife didn’t stir once until after I made sure Hadley got up to her apartment okay. It sucked that I couldn’t go up and double-check that she had everything locked up properly, but I also wouldn’t risk leaving my passed out wife in the car. Hadley called me once she was safely tucked into her apartment.
“Everything locked up?” I asked her.
“Yes, daddy!” She snickered at her own joke. “Wait, that felt gross. Can’t say that to my bestie’s hubby.”
“I’m taking off, are you sure you’re okay?” I asked.
“Yep, but you won’t be if you don’t pull your head out of your butthole. She was never devastated over losing Beckett.
I took her at her word, and headed home with my wife.
“Feel for ju.”
“What’s that?” I asked as Courtney mumbled.
“Fell in looove,” She sang the last word in a long drawn out, very off-key note.
“You fell in love?” I questioned.
“Yep!”
“Was it with Sparks from the bar?” I asked. If she said yes, I might have thrown myself out of my own moving car.
“My hubb-and.” Her answer made me grin, not that she could see it with her face buried in the leather seat. She had never told me that she loved me before. While they were a drunk woman’s words, I still held onto them tightly.
“Love him.” She managed to mumble again.
“He loves you too,” I told her.
“Yeah?”
“Positive,” I answered. Before I could say more I heard her snort before she started to snore again. “I was just about to call you sweetheart, but with that loud-ass snore, we might need to search for some butch biker names for you instead.