me, our bodies together, our souls wrapped into one.
My arms and legs wrapped around him, and I breathed against his mouth, loving how wonderful it felt to have this man so close to my heart. We hadn’t said those special words to each other since the first time, but I liked it that way. I liked knowing how he felt about me in the silent moments, when he went out of his way to do something for me and I didn’t have to ask, when he looked at me like I was the most special thing in the world. I knew how he felt without his having to say it, and that was better than the actual words.
And he knew how I felt about him, because it was obvious in everything that I did.
3
Carson
My phone rang on my desk in my cubicle at work.
I answered while keeping my eyes focused on the last words I was writing on my laptop. “Boss bitch.”
Vince chuckled. “I want to talk to you in my office.”
“Be there in a sec.” I hung up and spun around in my chair before I got to my feet and walked to the other side of the room.
Charlie intercepted me on the way. “Got plans tonight?” He turned around in his chair so he could face me, wearing a brown jacket with a black shirt underneath.
“Not with you.”
“Not with Dax either, right?”
“Well, I always have plans with him. He’s just my last appointment of the night.” I waggled my eyebrows.
He couldn’t suppress the smile my words caused.
“I’m going to Kat’s later. Don’t expect a happy ending.”
“I’m not. I just want some progress.” He turned around in his chair again and went back to his laptop.
I walked across the floor and entered my boss’s office. “Boss bitch is here. What can I do for you?”
Vince was a laid-back guy who knew how to take a joke. As long as you did your work right and submitted it on time, he couldn’t care less about your professional decorum. He was a great boss. “I’ve got something for you. I know you’re already juggling a couple things, but I thought this would be a good fit.” He set a folder at the edge of his desk, and that motherfucker was thick. It was stuffed with pages and pages.
“As long as it’s not the Lifestyle section, I’m good.” No offense to anyone who was interested in gardening tips, but I didn’t care about stuff like that. I grabbed the folder and took a seat so I could open it and take a look. “The pharmaceutical business.” I nodded slightly. “They’re more corrupt than the mob.”
“Definitely. They’re cutting opioids with dangerous levels of fentanyl, which is causing more people to either overdose or get sick, and then they end up in the hospital. Not only that, but the cost of insulin just increased by three hundred percent. And you know who benefited from that?”
“Oh, I know exactly who. The CEO.” These criminals were amateurs, thinking they could continue shady money moves and nobody would notice. In this day and age, people noticed everything. With the internet, there was no way to be secretive about anything anymore.
He gave me a look of approval. “Bring them down, boss bitch.”
“Oh, I will.” I stood up and flipped my hair before I strutted out of his office. “There’s definitely going to be some death threats.”
“But they won’t be able to shake you down.”
I turned around when I reached his door. “No, honey. I’ll be the one making the death threats.”
Kat and I sat in her apartment and ate the burritos I’d picked up on the way from the office. We sat at the dining table and had a couple of beers since our usual choice of wine wouldn’t pair with our Mexican food.
She seemed to be in mostly good spirits, but there was definitely a sadness to her eyes that never went away, even when she laughed. “I’m really glad you and Dax worked it out. I know what he did was shady, but I get it. I have a lot of rich clients who are super paranoid and private. They don’t want anyone to know they’re rich, and they only socialize with other rich people because they know they won’t care that they’re loaded.”
It was water under the bridge at this point. I forgave him and moved on. He and I were from different worlds, but when we were together, that didn’t really matter. “It’s fine.