Chapter 19
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“You look like hell.” Fletch reclines in his chair, his feet on his desk, and throws a tennis ball six feet into the air, catching it again on its way down.
“You haven’t shaved in days. You changed your shirt, but only ‘cos the last one looked like Swiss cheese. You have bags under your eyes large enough to take a family of five on vacation, and I strongly suggest you talk to your dentist, because even the rookie mentioned how much you’ve been grinding your teeth lately. ”
I shoot an unhappy look toward Officer Clay sitting studiously at his desk, his back ramrod straight and his eyes scouring reports about… fuck knows what.
“I’m not saying you smell or anything, but every time I look at you, I expect to see the squiggly cartoon lines.” Fletch gestures my way. “Ya know, wafting up from your shoulders.”
“I suggest you stop looking at me altogether.” I scroll through my emails on my phone and watch in real time as my next meeting comes together smoothly. A half-dozen men, all interested in buying the same fucking product in a world where supply is low and demand is high.
Means I get to name the price.
Adrenaline sizzles in my veins as Mihalis Salonen’s name pops up on my screen, and immediately under that, his invitation acceptance.
Tonight.
Because he’s not taking my wife anywhere.
“I guess we still have no resolution on the home front, then?” Fletch’s stare warms the side of my face. “It’s Friday, and she left Tuesday. That’s only three days, but I swear to Christ, it feels like this shit has been going on for a month already.”
“I’m working on a resolution.” I keep my tone flat.
My eyes on my screen. My whole fucking life hums along in a holding pattern until Cordoza says I can do otherwise.
“I don’t wanna talk about it.” At Lindon Tsiklauri’s email confirmation for tonight’s meeting, I lock my phone and look up at my partner. “You ask Fifi out yet?”
He barks out a laugh that has Officer Clay’s eyes swinging across. Dropping his feet and sitting tall in his chair, he opens his top drawer and tosses the tennis ball inside for another time. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”
“Why not? You like prying into my shit. Why isn’t this a two-way street?”
“Bitch, it is! You’ve been so up in my business for years now, I’m not sure the last time I had privacy.” He shoves up from his chair and leaves it spinning as he takes off toward the war room.
So I stand and follow.
“Things seem to have calmed down between you and Fifi.” I close the door behind me and lift my brows, surprised at Fletch’s nervous pacing. He’s freaking out and wants no witnesses. “What?” I glance around the room. “What’s the problem?”
“There’s no problem.” He snatches up a marker and stops in front of the board we’ve been working Morty Presley’s case on.
I can’t say I’ve tried all that hard while I’ve had other things on my mind.
So sue me.
“Presley’s wife said he and the daughter’s boyfriend—”
“Yeah, we’ll talk about that later.” I search his honeycomb eyes. “What’s up with the Fifi thing?”
“What Fifi thing? There is no Fifi thing. Also, her name is Seraphina. She doesn’t like it when people call her Fifi.”
“Eh.” I pull out a chair and drop. I’m so fucking exhausted, my knees knock the moment I stop walking. “She doesn’t like it when we call her Fifi. We don’t like it when she quits her job and forces Minka to get used to a new assistant. It is what it is.”
“What do you care about Minka’s assistant situation?” He turns from the board and glowers. “You broke up with her, remember?”
My smile, small as it was, drops away. “I didn’t break up with my wife, dickhead. Taking a couple of days apart is not the same as ending a relationship.”
“You sure?” He sets his hands on his hips, challenging me right back.
“I caught Jada with her skirt around her hips and another cop enjoying what wasn’t his.
I wanted to kill him, you told me to walk away and cool it.
That started out as taking a couple of days apart, and ended up here.
” He brings his shoulders up, shrugging.
“We divorced, she’s dead, my daughter’s asking crazy questions like ‘why didn’t I get to grow in Fifi’s tummy, Daddy?
’ and now I’m sweating.” He shows me his hands. “I have sweaty palms!”
“That explains the jittery weirdness, huh?” I refuse to discuss divorce and death, because even thinking those words and applying them to my relationship gives me sweaty palms. “Does Fifi know about Moo’s question?”
“No!” He throws his hands toward the ceiling.
“Are you insane? Sera is a slippery eel as it is. Can barely keep her in one place long enough to get a sniff of her pretty hair. I tell her about my daughter wanting an up-close and personal tour of her fucking stomach, and she’ll leave scorch marks on the floor on her way out.
Then Mia’s little heart will break, again, and it’ll be my fault, again. ”
“Things are going well, then.” I drag the heel of my palm across my aching chest and think of yesterday.
From bullets and bruises, to Minka laying her cheek right over my heart.
And then I think of today, and Harrison’s updates: she’s looking for her next target, and entirely too fucking comfortable playing up her role as the damsel in need.
“I could babysit for a night. Ya know, if you wanted to ask Fifi out to dinner.”
Fletch scoffs.
“I mean it. Mia loves being at the house, and it’s not like she won’t have Cato there, too. And Steve. And Mary.” And Minka… maybe… if she can hold on just another day or two in this hell I’ve created for us both. “You deserve a night out, and—”
“Dude. Cato asked if he could formally and literally adopt my daughter. Like…” His eyes widen with desperation. “He wasn’t even kidding. Offered me a cool million dollars to sell her to him.”
“Well…” I scratch my jaw, chuckling. “He loves her, so…”
“I’m not without babysitters, Arch! It would be easy to have someone take care of her for the night. The problem is I don’t have a date, and Sera has made her wishes clear. She’s not crossing that picket line ever again. She doesn’t want me. She wants my daughter.”
“You sure about that?” I settle back in my chair and bring my right foot up, resting it on my left knee. “I have it on good authority Fifi was certifiably losing her fucking marbles at the mayor’s office when she heard about our…” I shrug. “Incident.”
“Incident,” he scoffs. “The one where you ate three slugs?”
“I didn’t eat them. I walked into them. There’s a difference. And uninterested women don’t freak out on the mayor when a cop gets shot on the job. She’s cautious, because things already got a little messy between you. But she’s not uninterested.”
“You better study me.” Growling, he drags out a chair and plops onto the cushion so the faux leather wheezes as air releases.
“Study me hard. Because after this bullshit with Minka, she’s gonna be cautious, too.
We already knew she was wary, and she doesn’t trust easily.
Now you’ve gone and Fletched your entire marriage up. ”
“Did you just use your own name as a verb?”
“Yes! Because when I do things, I do them well!” He runs his hand through his hair, frustrated and frazzled. “When Delicious deigns to allow you to breathe the same air as she once more, you’re gonna be glad you got a front-row seat to my shitshow.”
“You’re not even with Fifi. Why the fuck would I study your method?”
He drops his hand and harrumphs, narrowing his eyes. “It’s a slow build.”
“Slow build to death. And in the meantime, you risk some other prick waltzing in and taking your seat. While you’re out here tiptoeing around her, too terrified to sneeze in her general vicinity for fear she’ll run, there are countless other entrepreneurial bastards who won’t be nearly as gentle.
If she isn’t fielding dinner requests at least once a day, I’ll eat my hat. ”
He grits his jaw, the muscles beneath his skin swelling. “If I move too soon, she’ll dip. If my daughter mentions the being in her belly thing to her face, this whole situation explodes. My process is better, I promise.”
“I wouldn’t bet on it.” But I look to the board and cast fresh eyes over Morty Presley’s life. His work. His marriage and parenthood. “Have you considered what life is gonna be like when Moo is sixteen and looking at boys?”
“Yeah. I’ve got it all planned.” He tips his head back and grins the grin of a desperate, slightly unhinged man.
“We’ll be living in a cave in the Swiss Alps.
No technology, no internet, no phones. Not sure which boys you think she’ll be looking at, since I’ll be the only one in a five-hundred-mile radius. ”
I snort.
“And besides, what makes you think you have the luxury of setting Delicious aside?” He brings his eyes back to mine.
“She’s beautiful. She’s intelligent. Successful.
She’s got a mean right hook and a bad attitude, but folks don’t really notice those until after they fall head over heels stupid for those cute little dimples in her cheeks.
You’re out here telling her to get. But you haven’t considered the very real risk someone else might step in and ask her out? ”
“Someone else already has.” I push up from my seat, too fidgety to stay seated, and circle the table. I steal his marker and pull the cap off. “For the first time in her life, my darling wife decided to go for a run by the bay this morning.”
He spins in his seat and watches me through tight eyes.
“She pulls on a pair of tight shorts and ties her hair up, and just like that, she’s luring a dumb motherfucker in and making dinner plans.”
“And you just…” He gawks. “Let it happen?”