Chapter 47
Daniel
When I got out of the shower, I heard her voice from my kitchen. I couldn’t hear what she was saying, but I knew who she was talking to. My phone pinged with updates from Terry, and the new app he installed showed a live transcript of her conversation.
Every single word out of her mouth made me fall for her more and more. Terry was right—she was terrifying.
I put on a pair of sweats and went out to the kitchen to make her a proper cup of cappuccino, which I knew she didn’t make herself, or I’d have woken up from the loud machine grinding the coffee.
When I walked into the kitchen, she was on a stool, leaning on the counter, wearing one of my old college t-shirts. Her black and red tattoo swirled around her thigh, visible until the hem of the shirt covered the rest of it, which I had already seen back at the hotel.
I had never wanted someone as badly as I wanted her, which made me second-guess myself. The confidence I usually had in previous relationships was gone. She made me nervous and scared I’d make the wrong move, say the wrong thing, and chase her away.
I shook my head, reminding myself to trust her, that she would tell me if I did something wrong instead of running away, and that she wanted this.
With that in mind, I stalked up to my girlfriend in my kitchen, put my hand on the side of her neck, and kissed her.
Did I have a mild heart attack when her eyes widened for a moment? Yes. Yes, I did. But it was worth it when she relaxed and kissed me back.
I kept my lips on hers and felt her smile.
“Please tell me you didn’t drink instant coffee.”
Her smile widened. “I did. Would it disturb you to know that I still enjoyed it?”
I kissed her again and leaned back. “So you don’t want me to make you a proper cappuccino then?”
“Daniel, the answer to that will always be yes.” Her eyes trailed down my bare chest slowly, lingering on the tattoo-covered bullet wound for a second before moving down to my sweats and then back up to my eyes. She didn’t blush when I clearly noticed her checking me out—she just smiled.
I’m in trouble.
I turned around to make her coffee, feeling her eyes on me the entire time. I liked it. I loved it. She was always completely and unapologetically herself—weird, blunt, and open with her thoughts.
I handed her the mug and sat beside her, not even trying to hide that I had to readjust myself when she hummed in approval at the first sip.
“You’re better than the barista across the street from Mason Corp.”
“Then come here every morning for your fix. I’m only a few minutes drive away from Becca’s office.”
“I’m meeting her today.”
Well, that’s a change of subject, sort of.
“I thought you start on Monday.”
Lydia shrugged. “I don’t want to wait. I texted her and she said it’s okay to stop by for an unofficial visit. She’ll show me around the office and tell me more about what I’ll be doing there.”
“Want me to drop you off at home to change?”
“Nope. Unofficial visit. I’ll just wear your enormous shirt and my jeans, it’s fine.”
“I like the idea of you wearing my shirt all day.”
“Is that another man thing?” She tilted her head a little to the side.
“Probably. Unless you have a thing for seeing me in your shirts, too. Don’t think I’ll fit though.”
Her smile widened, and for a moment, I thought I saw a mischievous gleam in her eyes. “I don’t know, Daniel. I’ll need to see you in one of my shirts first to find out.”
“You’re teasing me.”
“I am. Though I can’t say I would stop you if you tried. I’m sure it would be amusing.”
After a few quiet moments, she finished her coffee and got up to go back to my bedroom without saying another word.
I watched her get dressed, which just entailed pulling up her jeans, tying a knot on my t-shirt so it sat at her waist, and putting half of her hair in a bun with that pointy bone stick. I don’t know why, but it felt intimate—us getting ready together, getting dressed.
“I saw your conversation with Kernel earlier.”
“And?”
“What’s your plan with him?”
“Get the information you need to close the investigation and use him to protect Becca, if Langford really is responsible for what happened at that hotel.”
I didn’t like the way Kernel spoke to her. He was clearly obsessed. It wouldn’t be difficult for someone like him to stalk her now that he knew who she was.
“I still want to kill him for what happened to Natalia.”
Lydia took two big steps toward me and put her hand on my chest. “If he needs to die, he’ll die. Focus on your company and your sister until then.”
I leaned down to kiss her. “Yes, ma’am.”
* * *
After dropping Lydia off at Becca’s office and making sure my sister was there with both of her bodyguards, I went to Mason Corp. My floor was empty since Chris and Dianne would only be back on Monday.
I made myself coffee on the very loud machine in the breakroom and sat at my desk to go through emails and messages from reception over the last few days.
They were all forwarded to Chris and me, so I had already given them all a quick glance on my phone.
Despite getting a full week's paid leave, Chris was still checking and responding to emails, clearly working from home and answering partners and clients who reached out to me. He knew I didn’t expect it, and I had berated him in the past for working on his days off, but Chris was Chris.
He couldn’t sit still or ignore work piling up while he was having a good time.
I had lunch at my desk and caught up with Jake, who had two people tracking Langford with nothing to report.
Terry also called to let me know he was using my algorithms to analyze data collected from various sources regarding Langford with the hopes of finding anomalies—a big lot of nothing so far, but it was still early.
I was going to text Lydia and ask her how things were going, but she beat me to it with a text that had me frowning the rest of the day.
?? Send me Cole’s number, please