Page 76 of Kissing Kayley
“Because if I’m here in DC, it makes it kind of hard for her to teach in California. Unless you’re rich enough to help her commute onAngelevery day, which I’m certain you aren’t.”
Jordan rolled his eyes. “Ever hear of virtual teaching, dumbass? Besides, you’re eligible for retirement.Whyare you stillhere?”
“Uh, because I’m working The Shift? And I’m on duty? What are you getting at?”
Jordantskedand shook his head at me. “That’snotwhat I mean, dumbass.Why? Why are youhere? Who cares if you worked The Shift? Literallynoone but you. I guarantee nobody in the history ofeverwas on their deathbed and said, ‘Gee, I wish I’d chosen working The Shift over true love’.”
Jordan had a point. WhydidI care?
“And if you’re going to retire,” Leo added, “don’t wait. Every day you wait is one day less you could be retired and enjoying life. One day less you’ll have to enjoy being retired and doing something other than working.”
I had served a long, distinguished career in a very exclusive, demanding job, and had a jacket full of awards and commendations for it.
Except those didn’t cuddle up to me at night and give the best blow job I’d ever had.
WhatdidI have to prove? I’d never aspired to run the PPD, much less the entire Secret Service.
I was already part of an elite echelon of agents who’d worked The Shift with POTUS and VPOTUS.
I wasn’t getting any younger.
It was too easy to delude myself that there was always time to have it all when, in fact, there wasn’t always time.
Stella Woodley’s murder was grisly proof of that.
Even though I was at work and had vowed I wouldn’t let my personal life bleed into it, I had to ask. “What’s going on? Did she say something? Is she breaking up with me?”
Jordan shrugged. “I mean, didn’t you kinda do that by dropping the ball? You claim to love her and then turned around and turned your back on her and seem to be happily ignoring her.”
Leo glanced around. “Jordaaaan,” he darkly whispered. “I warned you about?—"
“No, Daddy. I’ve held my tongue long enough. Spank the crap out of me later.” He refocused on me, nudging his glasses up his nose, and I struggled not to take a step back from the absolute rage I felt washing off of him.
Like I said, people always underestimate the man, but he’s far more terrifying for that very reason.
“She didn’t have to say anything,” Jordan continued, “but I know from painful personal experience that the Cruz kids tend to be dumbasses when it comes to speaking their true minds because they overthink not being domineering assholes. They’re malignantly self-sacrificing, too much for their own good.”
He hooked a thumb at Leo, who now covered his eyes with his hand while slowly shaking his head. “Take Daddy here, who let me walk out the damned door and return to Florida when he didn’t want me to. I thought he didn’t want me when communication died between us, when in his mind he thought he was doing what was best for me and what he thought I wanted and had asked for. When the truth was I was miserable. All I wanted was for him tofightfor me. To demand I not leave in the first place, or to come drag me back to DC by the hair. Thank god Elliot’s as stalky and possessive as Leo or we might all still be miserable.”
He leaned in, dropping his voice to a dangerous hiss. “So deass your fucking head or prepare to have your life fucked completely up. If you can’t be a man and outright end things with her, and you leave her spinning in the wind, Iwillmake your life a living hell. Don’t think I can’t, because if you knowanythingabout me—and as head of Bardales’ detail you damned sure should—then youknowpeople have always underestimated me.”
Leo reached out to haul Jordan back to his side, but the smaller man deftly avoided him and continued. “I love her—she’s my sister. Maybe by marriage, but still, if you don’t nut upone way or the other and either get her back or definitively end things so she can at least get the fuck out of limbo, you’ll wish you’d never entered the Secret Service.”
He jabbed a finger at me as Leo finally got a grip on his other arm. “And don’t think I can’t, because you havenoclue who I am. I’ll take whatever spanking I get from Him on the other end of it.”
Nooo, I had a pretty damned good idea of who Jordan was. Like I said, he had a scary rep among the PPD agents, specifically those who’d worked The Shift protecting Woodley, first as VPOTUS and then as POTUS.
But this also gave me hope, surprisingly enough. “Do you think I have a chance to win her back?” I asked.
Jordan shrugged. “Took Elliot years to get his shit together.” He poked Leo in the arm. “Then six months after this dummy let me leave, Elliot came after me. OnAir Force Two, mind you. Sent two Secret Service agents to my office and metaphorically dragged me back. Let that be a lesson and don’t waste time. Takeaction. Life’s short, you fucking moron.”
I heard a woman clear her voice behind us and turned to see Ily Bardales standing there.
She walked over. “Let me get this straight,” she said. “You love Kayley,andyou’re eligible to retire, and yet here you are…why, exactly?”
I stammered to answer but she let loose, pelting me with a rapid-fire string of Spanish peppered with some very colorful swear words. Then she poked me in the chest. “Listen to me. That woman isthebest thing that ever happened to your ass.Andshe’s waited around all these years?”
She lightly smacked me on the side of the head, which I wasn’t expecting. “Get your head out of your ass,coñyo!”
