Shot in the Dark (Blackbridge Security #2) - Marie James Page 0,21
didn’t see my screens flash.
“It’s not what it looks like!” Puff Daddy assures him.
“Who were you watching?”
“No one,” I lie, the instinct too strong to confess the truth.
“Who’s the girl with purple hair?” Anna asks, and I’ve never felt betrayal burn so deep.
“Nice, Anna,” I snap. “Thanks.”
Deacon gives me a look that seems more like a command so I press a few keys until the screens come back to life.
I know what he’s seeing. Whitney is on the treadmill in one shot. The mail area of our apartment complex is on another. Her front door, 913, is visible from how zoomed in the shot is.
“Wren.” His tone is all warning, and despite the happiness I know he’s feeling for the awesome turn of events in his life, I can sense his disappointment.
I could call him out right now and tell Anna how he’s been a creep himself, but I’m not one to gaslight.
“Uh oh!” the bird squawks. “Busted!”
“You still haven’t given that girl her stuff?”
“She’s pretty,” Anna says as she leans in a little closer to the monitor.
“Wren,” Deacon repeats.
“I can’t!” I snap. He has to know I can’t do that.
“What’s going on?” Anna asks, confusion clear on her face because she hasn’t been around the last month to witness my shameful behavior.
“You have to,” Deacon urges.
“I can’t just walk up to a girl and hand her a box of dicks!”
Anna laughs, which sets the damn bird off. Puff Daddy throws his head back and cackles like a fool. Tonight may be the night I follow through with the threats of cooking his ass for dinner. Where’s the damn loyalty?
“You can’t stalk her like a damn creep either!” He points to one of the video feeds behind me. “Is that her fucking apartment?”
“It’s not in her apartment,” I argue, needing to clarify that I’m not that big of a creep.
“You need to get this shit straightened out.”
“He’s in love!” I glare at Puff Daddy because I feel like I’m being chastised by my nana. She wouldn’t approve either.
“I mean it, Wren. Give that girl her stuff and stop being a creep.”
“So it’s okay when you do it? But no one else is allowed?”
Anna laughs, touching him on the chest, and somehow it seems to settle him some. Did he tell her what he’s been doing? What he’s been having all of us do each night? Surely, she’s creeped out by that.
“Stop living in your computer, and get out into the real world,” Deacon insists. “It’s making you weird.”
Unable to come up with a better argument, I turn around and begin shutting down the feeds I’ve been monitoring for the last month.
“Let’s let him grieve,” Deacon tells his woman as they leave my office. “We have a lot of time to make up for.”
He can’t imagine how right he is. It does feel like grieving, like I’m losing something. In actuality, it just means I may be working more from home so I can watch those feeds from there. Determined to get home and set up quickly, I make sure Puff Daddy has food and water. I even turn the wildlife channel on so he can watch, but I leave his ass in my office. I grab the offending box and cart it out of the damn office, refusing to acknowledge the chuckles behind me, accompanying my walk of shame to the elevator.
The drive home is quick, and after I make a quick stop to check my mail, I can get this damn box stashed away never to be seen again.
As I walk inside, I consider throwing the entire thing in the dumpster out behind the building, but that doesn’t seem right.
“Teach that bird any more foul language?”
I stop in my tracks, one hand holding my mailbox key, the other arm wrapped tightly around the damn box of sex toys.
“He already speaks too much,” I tell Whitney with a grin.
A quick look down tells me that the label on the box is folded inside, and I breathe a sigh of relief.
“I found him entertaining.”
“I’m glad you were entertained by my embarrassment.”
She grins even wider. Damn if she isn’t the prettiest thing I’ve ever laid my eyes on.
“So, I got the filthiest he had to offer?”
Does she even realize how damn sexy she is?
“He gets worse.”
I’m just grateful he didn’t see her and squawk something about Major, the character she resembles. Maybe he does have my back when it counts.