Groaning, I ran a hand over my face. There were reasons I still lived alone at nearly forty. The elevator doors opened and I marched off to my doom.
Once I reached the server room, I stopped, feeling silly as anxiousness churned to life in me. This was my company, the one I’d started out of my spare bedroom. I tamped down the urge to knock and shoved the door open instead because I owned this building and every office in it. Kyle and Donahue, who had been with me for years, since nearly the beginning, were both standing near a third desk that hadn’t been tucked in the small room the last time I was down here.
Two somber, accusing faces turned toward me.
“Captain America punches Nazis in the face,” Donahue said apropos of nothing, pointing at the poster on the wall, and Kyle nodded as if his words made sense, scowling in my direction. His nostrils flared. Fuck, I’d really pissed them off, too. It wasn’t just Raven. I snapped my shoulders back to stop myself from rubbing my face and looking guilty.
“There was a fun-sized goth in my office. Is that still a thing? Goth? Anyway, a guy with nail polish and dark clothes….”And a tight little body that looked hot as fuck.The longer I thought about the man I’d lost my shit on, the more I wished I’d held it together to at least get to stare at him longer. Maybe I’d have to break something up there later this week. Nothing big, or Raven would have my ass. Maybe my printer. I raised my hand to about my shoulder and then lowered it a bit. “Yeah, he barely came up to my sternum. This big. Where is he?”
“Why?” Kyle asked suspiciously. He scratched at the blond stubble on his jaw.
“Yeah,” Donahue echoed him. “Why do you need to know?” He crossed his arms and together they made the least intimidating pair of bodyguards in all of history.
“I owe him an apology.”
Kyle and Donahue turned to look at each other and did a freaky thing where they communicated mostly using their eyes. There was forehead scrunching and eyebrow wiggling and even some shoulder shrugging. Kyle finally nodded and then turned to me. “Angel. That’s his name. That’s who you owe an apology. You scared him off, boss man.”
The censure was clear, and I was afraid for my client files. Not that they would actually do anything to hurt my business, but they could move things around and make a mess. It had happened once when they were bucking for a raise. My gut sank.Angel.Sweet name for a sweet guy, who didn’t deserve the way I’d acted toward him.
The laugh that sneaked out of me sounded more like a wounded goose. “Scared? For real? Am I actually that terrifying?”
Donahue snatched up his mug from the desk and then slurped his coffee in a way that made my eye twitch. “Mm-hmm. Went home.”
“I did tell him he was being too sensitive. Everyone knows how you are.” Kyle lifted an eyebrow and stepped toward me. “We told him you wouldn’t fire him. You won’t, right?” There was steel in his tone that surprised me. “You told me I could hire someone and he’s been the best assistant we’ve ever had.”
“The best,” Donahue echoed.
Anger, at myself, had me sucking in a deep breath. I clenched my hands into fists and then unclenched them when Donahue and Kyle shared another one of those symbiotic, squirrely looks. It was frustrating as hell, but I was too big to do things normal men did. Everyone was scared of me, even when I wasn’t about to flip out.
“I’ll, uh, go fix your computer,” Kyle said in a rush. Maybe some of those things I’d been thinking, and the irritation that went with them, had made their way onto my face. He sucked in his gut and slithered around me and out the door. Donahue went back and sat at his computer, ignoring me completely.
It would probably have been fine to let this go, but I couldn’t shake the actual terror I’d seen in Angel’s pretty brown eyes. I’d just been too far gone to pull myself back. He’d vanished before I had a chance to force myself to act right.
“Son of a bitch,” I grumbled and pulled my phone from my pocket. I sent Raven a quick message asking for Angel’s address and thought maybe I would have to ask for his last name for her to help me, but I hadn’t even made it to the front lobby before she responded with an address and thumbs-up. She obviously approved of me being proactive, and while that was nice, my guilt was already swelling in my gut—along with another unpleasant sensation.
It sucked that he was scared of me.
Walking out of the building into a bright winter morning, I sighed. Sunshine glittered on piles of dirty snow beside the sidewalk and cars buzzed by faster than they should in the street beyond. The cold didn’t bother me much, never had, and I wasn’t going far, so I didn’t waste time going back upstairs for a coat. Bad memories battered at me the way they always did every time my control snapped. The guilt that followed these incidences reminded me of the worst times in my life.
An afternoon where everything had gone hellishly wrong tried to swirl to the front of my mind, but I refused to relive it right now. I could have ended up in prison. If it wasn’t for my two best friends lying out of their asses for me, I probably would have been in the back of a squad car. But all three of us had been guilty that day; I’d just been the one to get us involved.
Breathing out a harsh breath, I walked faster, my feet eating up the sidewalk between me and the apology I would have to make. It had been a while since I’d done something horrible enough that it required the words “I’m sorry,” and I didn’t relish this. Sweat broke out on the back of my neck. The thing was, there would be no outrunning my responsibility today.
The residential area was smacked up against the business district—it would have been a waste to get my car for this trip—but it wasn’t houses, more holding pens for tech employees and office workers. I would never have wanted to live stacked together like this, neighbors above and below and beside me. The buildings I passed became more and more rundown until I found the address. The bland, tan high-rise that was Angel’s home only held efficiencies. We sometimes pointed workers who moved here from out of town this direction because the building was owned by Vane Elwood, the deputy mayor. It never hurt to be on the right side of city hall, especially if you were trying to do business in New Gothenburg.
Checking my phone again, I went inside and took the stairs—there was no elevator—to the ninth floor. The walls were dingy in the hallway, maybe white at one time, and the distinct, sweet odor of weed and cigarettes tinged the air. Every third light or so had gone out in the ceiling panels overhead, and I felt even worse for Angel, the tech assistant, as I navigated myself to number 908 and knocked on the door.
“Hold on” came an unsure voice from the other side, a nice tenor that sent tingles along the back of my neck.
The door opened and the same man from earlier froze. In slow motion his neck craned and his wide eyes took me in like I was the serial killer from a cheesy slasher flick. Somehow I hadn’t quite appreciated the dazzling comic-book blue tips in his hair and… was that liner around his eyes? They looked positively massive outlined in black. My throat shrank as I stared, and my blood heated and rushed south.
“What are you doing here?” he asked faintly and held onto the door, almost like it was the only thing keeping him upright. He gripped his shirt and crinkled the face on the comic book character.
Taking a deep breath, I tried out a smile. “I’m here because I owe you an apology for my behavior at the office.”
“You… came to apologize to me.” He leaned forward and glanced around the hallway. I wasn’t sure what he was checking for, but his plush mouth thinned and his grip on the door didn’t loosen.
“Yes, and to make sure that you’re coming back to work at Budget Busters. I have a feeling my computer might never work again if you don’t.” I rubbed nervous sweat from my hands on my suit jacket, and he watched me guardedly, almost like he thought I might reach out and strangle him.
