with a gun shoved to her head was seared on his brain. At that exact moment he’d understood. It was as if a gust of wind had swept away the fog that had obscured the truth he should have recognized long before. But instead of coming out with it right away, he’d screwed up bad at the hospital. He hadn’t said the right thing, which was ironic, considering his reputation for working a good sound bite. Years of having microphones shoved in his face had taught him how to divulge exactly what he wanted to, precisely as he intended. But when it came to saying the right words to Piper, he’d fumbled in the worst possible way, and now she wouldn’t take his calls.
The wound in his side was healing, but the rest of him was a mess. Someone knocked on his office door. This was the first time in days that anybody had bothered him. He didn’t blame them for keeping their distance. He was brusque with the customers, unhappy with the servers, and outright hostile to his bouncers. He’d even gotten into an argument with Tony because Tony insisted there was nothing wrong with the club’s HVAC system. But the air was stagnant, not circulating. So heavy with the funk of perfume and liquor it had seeped into Coop’s pores.
He twisted from the computer screen he’d been staring at for who knew how long and directed his wrath toward the door. “Go away!”
Jada barged into his office. “You broke up with Piper! How could you do that?”
“Piper broke up with me. And how do you know about it?”
“I talked to her on the phone. At first she didn’t tell me, but I finally got it out of her.”
He leaned back in his chair, trying to be casual, even though he wanted to shake the details out of her. “So . . . what did she say about me?”
“Just that she hadn’t seen you since the accident.”
“And from this you deduced that I’d broken up with her?”
“She sounded sad.” Jada dropped down on the couch. “Why did she break up with you?”
“Because she thinks I didn’t take our relationship seriously.” He couldn’t sit a moment longer. He shot up from his desk, then pretended to adjust the shutter slats on the window behind him.
“Is that what she said?” Jada asked.
“Not in so many words, but . . .” He made himself go over to the small refrigerator next to the bookcases. “She’s extremely competitive. She thinks I am, too.”
She leaned forward like a minishrink. “Aren’t you?”
“Not about her.” He pulled out a Coke and held it up. “Want one?”
Jada shook her head. “Are you going to try to get her back?”
“Yeah.”
“You don’t sound too confident.”
“I’m confident.”
“You don’t sound like it.”
She was right. He snapped the Coke’s pull-tab, even though he couldn’t drink anything right now. “She won’t talk to me. She won’t answer my texts or pick up her phone.” He wasn’t exactly sure why he was telling a teenager all this, except that she’d asked, and nobody else had been brave enough.
“You should go to her place and knock on her door,” Jada said. “She’s staying at her friend Amber’s. Or . . . you could wait by her car and then kind of jump out at her and make her listen to you.”
“That’s okay in the movies, but in real life, it’s called stalking. I want to talk to her, not piss—not make her madder.”
Another knock sounded on his door. “Get lost!”
The door opened anyway. This time it was Deidre Joss. Now he’d need to be polite, if he still remembered how.
“Bad time?” she asked.
“Sorry, Deidre. I thought it was Tony.”
“Poor Tony.”
He turned to Jada. “We can talk later.”
She hopped up from the couch. “Okay, but don’t tell Mom I yelled at you. She doesn’t like anything that upsets you.”
“Too bad everybody doesn’t feel that way,” he muttered.
Deidre closed the door after her. He realized he still had the Coke can and held it out. “Want one?”
“No thanks.” She looked as cool and sleek as ever in a tidy black suit. No rumpled jeans or Bears T-shirt. No blueberry eyes. Her hair was a smooth, dark curtain instead of a crazy muddle meandering here and there.
“How’s the injury?” she said.
“Barely noticeable.” Unless he moved too fast. It hurt then, but he wasn’t complaining.
“I’m glad to hear it.” She came farther into the room. “You haven’t returned my calls.” She said it without any snark, only sympathy. She