48. Frank
FRANK
While Griffin and I get the shop settled for the night, Zeb paces around the space. “We should have never let her leave without finding out what happened with Kai and Gage earlier.”
I don’t entirely disagree, but I respect her need to talk to a friend.
“I wonder what time she’ll get home,” Griffin says.
Zeb finally comes to a stop. “I’m not waiting. I’m going to go find out what they said to her.”
A half hour later, the three of us are striding into Beasts Ink’s main location, which luckily, stays open later than our shop.
Boss man Kai raises an eyebrow when we find him and Gage in the office. “Everything okay?”
I don’t waste time. “What was your meeting with Ember about?”
He and Gage exchange glances. “She didn’t tell you?”
“No,” Griffin says. “But she’s upset.”
Another glance, and then Gage sighs and says, “One of your clients over there lodged a complaint against Ember.”
“That’s bullshit,” I say immediately. “A complaint about what?” A quick glance at Griffin and Zeb shows they’re scowling as much as I am.
“Who was it?” Zeb says. “Who lodged the complaint?”
Kai settles back on his station and folds his arms. “A woman named Jennifer Banks.” He scans our faces. “I take it you all know who she is.”
“A woman named Jennifer has been in a few times,” I say. “She’s gotten ink from each of us. And flirted blatantly the whole time.”
“With all of you?” Gage says.
“Yeah. Recently divorced, she says. She touches us, makes suggestive comments, stuff like that.”
“She’s jealous of Ember because we’ve ignored her hitting on us,” Griffin says.
Gage cocks his head. “How would you not being interested in this client translate into her being jealous of Ember?”
Careful , I think at Griffin. Our bosses are no dummies.
Fortunately, he says, “She just assumes, because that’s what’s on her mind. Think about it. If there were really an issue with Ember, there’d be multiple complaints, and negative reviews online. Which there aren’t.”
“Good point,” Kai says. “Thanks for the additional context; we’ll take it into consideration.” His gaze sweeps across the three of us again. “Anything else you’d like to tell us?”
Fuck. We may have tipped our hand, all of us coming over here together, worried about her. “Everything’s good,” I say. “I haven’t paid attention to the financial side of things, but I take it Ember’s hitting her targets or it would have come up.”
“She’s hitting her targets,” Gage agrees, but there’s an undertone to his words that makes me think we’ve completely blown our cover.
We say goodnight and get the fuck out of there. As soon as we hit the sidewalk, I say, “We need to talk.”
“Agreed,” Griffin says.