Page 88 of Kylo
“But,” he went on, flashing me his palms, “that is all I am going to say about that. I would love to get in touch with you again. About plants, nothing else.”
“I would love—oh, hey, Traeg,” I said as he came breezing in with bags full of takeaway containers and a pizza box with drinks piled on top.
“Teddy! My man,” Traeger said, switching the bags to the pizza box hand so he could give Teddy a quick handshake. “Were you looking for me?”
“I just wanted to speak to Rue,” Teddy said. “But I will be in touch soon about the designs you sent over. Rue, it was a pleasure.”
With that, he walked to the door.
His driver opened it and the two of them were gone.
“I want to be that cool when I grow up,” Traeger said with a deep sigh.
“I think you need generational wealth for that kind of casual self-confidence.”
“Probably. So, what did he want to talk to you about?” he asked. “The plants?”
“Uh, well, he wanted to tell me he was going to reach out about the plants.” It was only a partial lie.
“See? Class act.”
He was.
And, what’s more, he did give me something to think about.
Because some part of me did want to make Kylo out to be a bad guy, someone who deliberately set out to screw with my emotions, to use me, then discard me.
Looking back, though, nothing about how he’d acted at the clubhouse had been pleased or indifferent to what Huck was saying to me.
He’d seemed upset, regretful, unable to even meet my eye.
And if what Teddy said was true about Kylo grieving as well, maybe I was being too harsh.
That said, my mind couldn’t let go of the lies.
I batted the issues back and forth until I felt dizzy.
Then I went home.
And, well, the shit really hit the fan.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Rue
It was just another night.
I cleaned up the store, dropped the money from the register, locked up, and headed home with Ernest.
“That’s a good boy,” I cooed at Ernest as he came waddling back into the kitchen after he did his business. “You already had dinner,” I reminded him as he sniffed out the pepperoni on my cold pizza I brought home from lunch, then sat down and tried to offer me his paw. “You know I’m a sucker,” I said, peeling off a pepperoni circle and giving it to him.
He’d just finished chomping when I heard something that made my heart lurch.
Crunching.
Like feet on the pea gravel that acted as a fire barrier between the house and the mulch that lined the flowerbeds around the house.
Sure, my house was in a neighborhood, but that didn’t mean wildlife didn’t find its way into my yard at times. It could be a raccoon, opossum, or maybe an iguana.
