Page 81 of His Hot Mess

“Let’s be alone,” I said. “I can close up early. No one else is going to come in this weather.”

But as if to prove me wrong, the door jingled for what felt like the hundredth time in the past five minutes. I jumped away, nearly falling before Chris caught me.

Charles Haverford was standing in the doorway with a man I didn’t recognize right behind him. They closed the door. Standing next to each other, I couldn’t help but appreciate how handsome they both looked; Charles in his high-end suit, and the other man in dark khakis and a wool coat.

“Er, sorry,” Charles said. “Didn’t mean to interrupt.”

I took a step away from Chris, as if putting a foot of space between us might make the two men forget we were making out during business hours just a second before.

“Hey, Hank,” Chris said, obviously not quite as mortified as I was.

“Chris!” said the younger of the two men. “Good to see you.”

“This is Hank Archer,” Charles said to me, “Of Archer Fire Inspection.” To Hank, he said, “Sadie Fulham runs this unit. And you know Mr. Slade?”

“Sure,” Hank said. “Grayscale’s one of my best customers these days.”

“Right,” said Charles.

“Fire inspection?” I asked. The faint headache that had been nagging me flared slightly. “Is something wrong?”

“Oh no, I was trying to reach you all day but decided just to drop by—Mr. Archer had a cancellation today and I wanted to get the inspection done before the tenants next door move in. Perfectly routine. Hope you don’t mind.”

I felt Chris press something into my hand. “This is why I came downstairs,” he said. “Your phone’s been going off all day. I didn’t hear it until I started on the bedroom.”

Oops. I looked at my phone. I had three missed texts and two missed calls, all from Charles Haverford except for the last call, from a private number.

“I won’t be more than a minute,” Hank said, “if you don’t mind—”

I looked up. Hank had trailed off in mid-sentence, and his face, I saw now, had gone pale.

Beside me, Casey emerged from the back. “That’s all for us,” she said. She was looking over her shoulder, holding the door to the back open for Lucy.

But when she turned to face forward she stopped dead. There was a long pause where no one said anything. Chris and Charles and I standing there awkwardly, while Hank and Casey locked eyes like they were in some kind of stand-off.

Finally, Hank said, “Hey Casey.”

Casey seemed to break out of her trance. She strode forward until she was standing right before Hank. Then, before anyone could understand what was happening, she reached out and slapped him across the face.

Lucy, standing next to me now, gasped.

“Lucy,” Casey said, her voice calm. “I’ll meet you in the truck.” Then she pushed through the door. The soft jingle of the bell seemed to echo throughout the space.

Charles opened his mouth, but Hank, briefly touching his reddening cheek, spoke first. “I’ll get this inspection done and out of your way right away,” he said to me. “Ms. Fulham?”

I could tell he wanted to be out of this room with the four of us staring at him.

“Could you show me to the back?”

Hank wasn’t lying, his inspection was only ten minutes long. I’d hung around with him in the back as he went around to all the points he needed to check, marking things on his clipboard. Charles and Chris stayed up at the front, chatting. Grayscale was planning to do a bunch of the upcoming work on some of Charles’s properties, I knew.

“That’s all I need,” Hank said, when he was done. He hadn’t spoken at all except to ask where various building elements were.

“Are you okay?” I asked, unable to hold it in anymore. “Casey got you pretty good.”

He looked at me. There was something stormy in his eyes. He looked so… intense. Devastated. “Yeah, well, I deserved it.”

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