Chapter 46
46
DAX
“Two maple, a strawberry with sprinkles, a bear claw, and–”
“You’re in big trouble, mister.”
I whipped my head around at Hannah’s voice and the way her finger poked into my arm.
“What the hell?” I muttered, blinking and totally confused.
“Hey, gorgeous,” Jack said, leaning down to kiss Hannah. “This is a surprise.”
Um, what the hell? Either she snuck in nice and quiet, or Hannah magically appeared. Either way certainly messed with my donut focus. “How did you get here?”
She went up on her tiptoes and whispered, “Besides the strength thing, I can also teleport. ”
My eyes widened and I studied her open and earnest face. “What?”
“You heard me.”
I spoke slowly and clearly so she knew it sounded ridiculous. And also, unbelievable. Yet here she was. “You. Can. Teleport.”
She nodded.
“Because of the radiation.”
She nodded again.
“Fiona said she wanted to meet you and share experiences with radiation treatment, but I didn’t think it meant bionic hearing, strength, and teleportation.”
“Yeah, well, don’t underestimate women. And oh, Fiona heard you, ” Hannah countered.
The teenager with goth black hair behind the counter cleared her throat impatiently.
“Got a bear claw?” I asked.
She nodded.
“One of those plus two crullers and a lemon filled.”
I tapped my phone to pay, then the three of us moved out of the way to wait for the order to be boxed.
“Can we circle back to the teleport thing again? What do you mean teleport ?” I whispered. “And why didn’t you tell me?”
“There are no variations to that word,” Hannah said, poking me in the chest. “I was somewhere else and now I’m here to tell you you’re in big trouble.”
I frowned. “What? Why?”
“Fiona overheard you. ”
“I know. She texted me what I said.”
“More than Canadian steel imports, you moron. She heard you telling Jack that you’re a…” She glanced around and lowered her voice. “A fixer.”
“What? We were in the car driving away when I said that.”
“Yeah, well she heard. She lost her shit.”
I had to think back to what I’d said.
I didn’t have to think long, because Jack filled me in. “She knows you’re working for the pickle people and she’s the problem you’re supposed to fix,” he provided. “She knows you’re a fixer and that I’m a former hitman. Am I right?” He looked to Hannah.
Hannah really liked to nod. “She thinks you’re in her bed as part of the job.”
I closed my eyes. “Fuck. That’s not it at all. The first time we weren’t even in a–”
I bit my lip, not wanting to tell Hannah we’d defiled the erotic section of her store. And her desk.
“She also thinks that you called us back from our Hawaiian vacation so Jack can…” She ran her finger across her throat.
“What the fuck? Of course not!” I set my hands on my hips, annoyed.
“I know that.” She pointed at herself, then me. “You know that. Jack knows that. Fiona doesn’t. She’s the FBI! You need to fix it. Now.” Hannah tapped her shoe on the tile floor as if she expected me to teleport to Fiona and grovel.
“These past few days have been ridiculous,” I admitted, running a hand over the back of my neck. “Between your store, storytime, the–”
“Storytime!” Hannah laughed. “God, you read Their Kidnapped Bride? ”
“Chapter three,” I gritted out.
Hannah put her fingers over her mouth trying to stifle more laughter, her eyes like saucers. She’d read the book and knew exactly how uncomfortable it had been.
“What’s in chapter three?” Jack asked, glancing between us.
Because a mother came in with two toddlers jumping up and down in excitement for a box of chocolate donut holes, Hannah went up on her tiptoes and whispered in Jack’s ear. A slow grin spread across his face. “I’m not up for sharing, but the rest? I’m game if you are, gorgeous.”
I rolled my eyes, knowing exactly what he was talking about.
“Can we stay on topic, please?” I prodded.
“What, you don’t want to talk anal before you have your donut?” Jack whispered.
I raised my hand and used my fingers to start ticking off all the insanity that had taken place when I was supposed to be taking a break. “There was a convenience store armed robbery, Fiona snooping at the pickle store and I had to tell them she was pregnant and had a craving to get us out of there. Then she had to protect me from the women of this town. They’re… feral.”
“You read chapter three. No wonder they’re feral,” Hannah countered .
“Now Max Pinter wants me to take care of Fiona because his pickle cronies have pictures of her snooping.”
“That’s easily solved. Just kick her out of town,” Jack said, as if he was wiping his hands of the problem in one sentence.
I shook my head. “She took a bag of the drugs. Oh, and they’re in your desk drawer, Hannah.”
“Order for Dex!” the goth girl called.
I didn’t correct her as I took the box.
“What do you mean she took a bag of pills?” Jack asked once we were out in the parking lot. “Gorgeous, you want a ride home?”
Hannah nodded.
I set the donut box on the roof of my car and told them. “She discovered they’ve got a secret compartment in the bottom of the five-gallon buckets where they were stashing the pills. She took a bag.”
We climbed in and I turned the car on. Jack held the donuts in his lap.
“They want their drugs back,” Jack assumed.
I shook my head. “I got the call to take care of Fiona before they found out the drugs were missing.”
Jack frowned. “That explains the text I got while we were on the plane.”
I glanced at him before backing out of the parking spot. “What text? I didn’t send you one.”
“No. From one of my former clients who knows I’ve moved to Coal Springs. The one who wants me to unretire to take care of a local problem. ”
I tipped my head back against the headrest, as if my problems were too much for me to even hold my head up.
“It seems your girlfriend’s really popular these days,” Jack added.
I saw the turn of his lips. He found this amusing. He found me amusing.
“They really want you to… kill Fiona?” Hannah whispered to Jack, even though we were in the car.
“Good luck with that,” I muttered. “She took down an armed robber single handedly. Literally, since she did it while holding a full coffee pot.”
“You should be worried about her killing you, Dax,” Hannah huffed. When I glanced at her in the rearview mirror, she sat back in the seat and crossed her arms.
She had a great point. The first woman who I let in, who I thought even for a second was worth the pain of losing, hated me. I’d worried about her being killed or something, not dump me because I fucked up. By keeping her out of my life, I was probably going to lose her anyway. I was in big fucking trouble.