Page 21 of Don't Remind Me
I stepped to the bar and slid the order form my way. Her smile grew as I picked it up and read it over for the third time.
I ignored the way my heart pounded in my chest.
Chapter Nine
Dani
Monday morning rolled around,and as I made my way through the office, it occurred to me what the jolts of energy shooting up my legs and sticking in my chest were. I wasnervous, which was ridiculous. I was just going to Ardena to drop off some symposium invitations for Jillian, who’d wanted to personalize a few before they were mailed. I’d sent out the rest with the office’s mail this morning.
The invitations going out made everything more real. The turning of a corner with no going back. This event was happening now, whether I got the signage, name tags, guest welcome packages, and a hundred other details finished or not. It was just a matter of what kind of experience the guests would have when they arrived.
That wasn’t why I was nervous, though.
He might not even be there, I reminded myself as I pushed through the main door of the building into the thick July heat. It washed over my air-conditioned skin with cozy warmth that quickly turned blistering. Hot waves radiated off the asphalt parking lot beneath my feet. The flutter in my stomach only grew with each step.
He probably wouldn’t be there. I was pretty sure Mondays had been one of Jase’s days off before Jillian roped him into catering the symposium, and now that the menus were finalized, I doubted he’d have a reason to be there an extra day.
But he might.
And that possibility alone was enough to send me over the edge.
The edge of what, I wasn’t sure. Just that after our conversation last week, I hadn’t been able to stop picturing his eyes as he said, “I wouldn’t call that a mistake,” or the way the muscles in his arms flexed as he crossed them over his chest. Or his lips—those fucking lips—as he’d smirked at my demands.
I’d imagined those lips on a dozen different places along my body since, from my throat to my toes with some notable stops in between. Just the thought had my stomach clenching and my body growing warm in a way that had nothing to do with the weather. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been this horny.
And okay, not all of me loved that it was Alec’s older brother I was lusting over, but it’d been so long since I’d felt this kind of attraction to anyone that a bigger part of me desperately wanted to enjoy it. It wasn’t like I was going to tackle him and start humping his leg. I just wanted another glimpse of his chiseled jaw and to see his hands glide across a cutting board.
His hands were…yeah.
I was so caught up dreaming about them that I almost missed the scrap of paper on my windshield. At first glance, it looked like a ticket, but this was HBC’s lot, and my car was where I always parked it.
I snatched the folded white paper from under the wiper. Nothing on the outside.
I flipped it open and read the words scratched inside.
My blood froze, my skin going cold. All of me went still except for my heart pounding in my ears as I read the note again.
Then I spun from my car and ran back inside.
The death threatlay open on Talia’s desk, the words glaring up at me, tracking my movements as I paced back and forth across her office. Nausea churned my stomach, climbing its way up my throat. Mr. Fisher—Geffery, he’d told me to call him—was here too, discussing the best course of action with Talia.
I couldn’t breathe.
It wasn’t just the note. It was that it had been left on my car. That whoever left it knew which car was mine in the first place. That they had been bold enough to do this in broad daylight.
Did they know where I lived? Would they follow me home? Try to hurt me?
What about the office? I’d read articles about nonprofits like ours across the country being attacked. Gasoline poured under their doors and ignited with people inside. Stink bombs set off in the ventilation systems.
Shootings.
Was this how those had all started? With hate mail and a note on a windshield?
I shook out my hands to try to get them to steady, but they wouldn’t. Instead, I clenched them into fists, pulling in short breaths as I attempted to take in what Geffery was saying.
“There were no other notes on anyone else’s car. It does appear as though they targeted Dani specifically.”
“Can we take it to the police?” Talia asked, the two of them standing around her desk, hovering over the note.
