Page 47 of The Revenge Agenda

Chapter 14

Rush

The pot is back on my desk. I probably should be annoyed, but it’s amusing at this stage.

There’s a note like last time, and his ant illustration is pointing at me and wearing a bow tie. It’s adorable.

Why are you so defiANT?

I smile and tuck the note into my desk drawer, then scramble to dig through my bag and find my notepad. My ant is slightly cuter than the one I drew the other day, and I add a halo above this one’s head.

I prefer the term compassionANT.

I’m about to reach for the sticky tape and attach my drawing to the pot when I notice the dispenser is missing from the outline I drew on my desk. Each of my items have pseudo-chalk drawing outlines to keep them in line, like my own stationery crime scene. Now, Miss Peacock is missing from the office block with my tape.

Or something like that.

I open my mouth to ask Autumn if she knows where the fucking thing is when Eloise steals her attention first.

“Did you hear poor Hunter is practically homeless?”

My head shoots up. Apparently, the way to get my focus these days is to mention Hunter. “He’s what?”

Her lips quirk as she looks me over in concern. “I know. I couldn’t believe it. Hannah from accounts said this morning that he was asking around about places. And you know we have that suite out the back of our place, but we literally just rented it. I feel terrible.”

“Yeah, uh-huh, okay. Homeless—can we go back to that?”

“He’s staying in a hotel, Rush. It’s horrible.”

I rub the coarse stubble on my jaw. “I think he mentioned something about that, actually.”

“He did? How long has he been staying there?”

“How am I supposed to know that? If he was moving in with his ex and that didn’t work out, then probably since they split?” Well over a month ago. “Why doesn’t he rent a place?”

“Keeps getting knocked back,” she says miserably.

Autumn swings her chair around to face me. “Don’t you have a bunch of spare bedrooms?”

“No. The four bedrooms that aren’t currently bedrooms are being used for other things.”

“What other things?”

“Xander’s paint room, my atelier, Molly and Seven’s office, and then the junk room.”

“Why can’t he have the junk room?” she asks.

“Because it’s for junk.”

Autumn sniggers. “I knew you were going to say that.”

“Then why did you ask?” I snap.

Eloise’s eyes are wide. “You can take the junk out of the room and it’s no longer a junk room, Carey. He could stay with you.”

She’s looking at me like I’m an idiot, and I’m not confident that I’m not giving her the same look right back.

“But then where would we put our junk?”

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