Page 6 of Sweet Shots

“Calling again so soon? You really must be miserable,” he says.

“Hello to you too. I need a favor.”

“Nothing like easing your way in.”

I smirk, taking off when my phone connects to the car, and I can talk to Zach through the speakers.

“From what I remember, you like it hard and fast.”

“Touché.”

Chuckling, I say, “So I can’t open another bank account in my name because of what happened. I need to put one in yours.”

I hold my breath as I wait for him to answer, coming to a stop at a red light. It’s not that I think he’ll say no, but this is a pretty serious thing.

“Yeah, okay whatever.”

“Really? That easily?”

“What are you going to do, Mikah? Steal my identity? Doubt it.”

“Good point,” I mutter, stepping on the gas when the light changes to green.

“Just tell me what you need, and I’ll get it to you.”

“Thanks, Zach. Seriously, this helps so much. At least I don’t have to worry about these assholes continuing to take everything from me.”

“You’re welcome, bestie. Call me later.”

We end the call, and I make my way home, feeling much better than I did yesterday. Yeah, my life is still messed up, but at least I’ve found some workarounds so I’m not entirely miserable—and broke. This is just a setback. I’ll figure it out just like everything else in my life.

The asshole neighbor is sitting on his deck with a beer in his hand. It’s nine in the morning. What is actually wrong with him?

Pulling into my driveway, I park and head inside, ignoring him even though I feel his glare on me. CP meows at me once I’m inside, rubbing along my legs. I reach down to pet him, but he skitters off before I make contact.

Fucking cats, man. I don’t even know why I got him in the first place. I know how cats are, but the ones in the trailer park were always so cute and loving. Probably because they wanted me to feed them. CP is spoiled as hell, so he doesn’t feel the need to be nice to me. He knows I’ll feed him regardless. Rude.

Heading to the kitchen, the large cat thunders after me, hoping for more food in his dish, but that isn’t happening. I gave him breakfast before I left. I, on the other hand, did not eat before I left this morning because I was so nervous that I was going to get canned from BTL. Sure, I could do my own thing, but I don’t know how to do that. I could figure it out, but that’stime I don’t have and money lost that I desperately need right now.

I’ve been saving in case I lost my job or subs stopped flowing in. But now I have nothing to fall back on. Everything was taken from me. I can’t even think about it. I swear I’m going to throw up if I do. Even the thought of having to go back to the trailer park…

Leaning on the counter, I bow my head and take a deep breath.

That isn’t going to happen. I don’t need to go back there. I’m not that hard off. Once I get paid this month, I’ll just—shit!

Dashing out of the kitchen, I scare CP so badly his feet scrape on the floor as he tries to run, but he stays in place for long enough that it’s comical. I run to my desk, flip open my laptop and go to the BTL website, immediately canceling my payment information. The last thing I need is for that money to go into the account while it’s negative. I’m not paying that negative balance off. It can get fixed when they look into my case and realize it wasn’t me!

When I’m done, I lean back on the couch and take a breath. My stomach growls, reminding me I need to eat, but after this, I’m not hungry again.

CP is glaring at me from across the room, swishing his tail back and forth.

With a roll of my eyes, I get up and go back to the kitchen, dumping three packets of strawberries and cream oatmeal into a bowl, adding water, then putting it in the microwave for twominutes. When it’s done, I take it back to my laptop and work on opening a new bank account. I text Zach the info I need, and he gets it to me right away.

There. Done. Simple enough. Though I think this is illegal, but whatever. It’ll have to do for now. Thank fuck for banks allowing you to open accounts online these days.

I check my phone, swiping down on my emails to refresh it to see if I got a response yet, but there’s nothing there. I even check my spam. Nothing. How long does it take for them to get back to me? Damn.

Patience has never been my forte, so I open the security app up and send another email. I’ll send one every hour if I have to. Someone in that place is going to get back to me.

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