Page 81 of Big & Bossy

“Black Americano.”

“Absolutely fucking not.” She made a fake gagging noise as she pushed the tea away from her with one finger, almost as if she was disgusted to even have to touch it. “Thanks but no thanks. What’s gotten into you, anyway? This wasn’t even you assuming I still liked an old order, Jack. This is, like, ten levels worse than that.”

I set my coffee down in front of her and leaned onto her circular desk. She was right. It sucked. I’d buy her a new one. “I’m sorry. I’m just… I’ve been pouring over this goddamn video footage from the security team for hours, and I still haven’t seen anything that’s piqued my interest. Nothing. It’s driving me insane.”

“Do you want some help? Maybe a second set of eyes?”

My brows creased as I looked down at her. “That might be the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

“Yeah, well, I’m bored. And you’re not exactly solving that.” She shrugged as she leaned forward, picking herself up out of her chair. “Do you want my help?”

“Yes,” I sighed, standing straight and grabbing our drinks. “Please. That would be amazing.”

“Sure. Just let me crawl out from under this stupid desk you insisted on.”

I rolled my eyes, motioning for her to follow me. “I’ll get you a new one.”

————

I paused the video for a second to rub my eyes before hitting play again. Angela hummed something from beside me, her eyes trained on the screen.

“What is your coffee order nowadays?” I asked, needing a small break from the monotonous job of just staring.

“Matcha latte,” she answered.

My eye twitched. “You know that’s a type of tea, right?”

“Shut up.” She leaned across me, hitting the play button. Seconds ticked by. Minutes. Almost at the end?—

There.

In the far back of the screen, a man with ashy blonde hair sat behind one of the computers, the monitor obscuring half of his face. I scrubbed forward a couple of minutes, waiting for him to get up, waiting for him to move farther into view, and the second he did, I screen-grabbed it.

I zoomed in.

Closer.

Closer.

Sharpened the image.

Nearly fell off my fucking chair.

Harry Voss looked dead-eyed into the camera, the smallest smirk on his face, laptop clutched in his hand.

Chapter 38

Mandy

The clacking of my nails on the keyboard was barely enough to keep my mind occupied. L&V Interiors was supposed to have a meeting with Jack tomorrow—one final tallying up of everything we’d done and how much he owed us. Harry was on the books to go to the meeting tomorrow instead of me but considering his tardiness and the number of emails and phone calls I’d received complaining about his performance lately, I wasn’t expecting him to actually follow through on it.

Which left it to me.

Harry had been off with me since the grand opening. At first I’d assumed it was just because he was still healing, but the longer it went on, the more it felt like a punishment. Like he’d somehow found out I’d had sex with Jack at the campus and hated me for it. But in fairness, I hated myself too.

But I didn’t want to see Jack again. That last romp in the spare office had been the last time, and I’d promised myself that. But I also told myself I’d never see him again, never give myself the chance to act on anything stupid, and now I was stupidly going to have that chance because Harry couldn’t get his act together.

I stared at my empty ring finger as I typed, that sinking feeling in my gut hitting me once again. I was having to fight myself more this time than I had ten years ago. Back then, I’d let myself fall apart because of him. I’d barely made it through my last year of college. I’d cried down the phone to anyone who would listen, distracted myself with pinball and studying but pestered Wade any chance I had. I wasn’t going to do that this time, but every time I saw the lack of a ring on my finger, it made me want to. Even after what he’d done. Maybe he’d been right — maybe he was just overworked and stressed out of his skull because of the supposed threat. But I couldn’t overlook what he’d done just because of that.

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