Graham smirked. “I check up on everyone. Even Paige. Besides, I want to see what a hundred and fifty grand birthday party looks like.”
“Holy shit, are you serious?”
“Half of that is our fee. Fucking kid’s birthday party.” Graham shook his head. “Paige quoted him the price thinking he’d balk. Guy didn’t even blink.”
Tinker frowned. “We sure this guy’s legit?”
“Yeah. Paige had Angie run him. He married old Charleston money. It’s not his, but he likes to throw it around like it is. He’s not doing anything illegal. Immoral is another story, but the wife’s prenup covers that.”
“Damn,” Tinker said.
“That’s not our problem. Unless she wants to hire us to get proof of his infidelity.” Graham clapped him on the shoulder. “Let me or Paige know if you need anything.”
Tinker nodded once. “Will do.”
He looked at his phone again, but it was as blank and silent as it had been five minutes ago. Fuuuccckkk. He should head down to the gym or the garage. But he knew neither working out nor tinkering on the vehicles would distract him.
Maybe Angie could hack her phone and see if Abby blocked him. He glanced across the room toward Angie’s corner. Jayne, their armorer, was leaning back in a chair in her large workspace, feet kicked up on the edge of her desk. Angie was making a show of ignoring him. If there were ever two people who needed to get over themselves and bang, it was those two.
Fuck it. He needed to pull up his Underoos and confront her in person. If she was blowing him off, and not in the good way, he wanted to know. He deserved to know.
Yeah, he was a fucking hypocrite. He grabbed his keys and headed for the hall. He didn’t care.
Tinker knocked harder and glanced at Abby’s car in the driveway. Unless they’d decided to go for a walk around the block, they were home. He braced against the door frame and waited. He’d wait all night if he had to.
He straightened when the door opened.
Abby stared, bleary-eyed, from the half-open door. “Tinker? What are you doing here?”
She looked like crap. Wrapped in a blanket with her hair piled on top of her head, her face was pale with dark circles under her eyes. Hell, she looked like she’d lost weight in the last few days. Tinker hesitated, maybe now wasn’t a good time. On the other hand, if he let it fester, he’d get more pissed and then say something that would make him a dick.
Fuck it. If she was done with him, timing wasn’t going to matter. He pushed in and closed the door behind him.
“What the hell, Tinker?” She pulled the blanket tighter around her.
“Why are you ignoring my calls?”
Abby stared at him like he’d grown two additional heads. “Are you serious right now?”
“Yeah, Abby, I’m serious. We fucked and a day later you ghost me. I’d like to know why.” He shrugged out of his jacket and threw it on the bench by the door.
She stared at the jacket, stared at him, and walked away mumbling something that sounded suspiciously like for fuck’s sake.
He followed her into the kitchen and watched her fill up an electric kettle and set it on its base. She turned and adjusted the blanket again. “I’ve been taking care of two sick kids since Tuesday afternoon. I didn’t think I needed to take care of a third.”
Well, fuck. That stung. He didn’t think he was being childish by asking what the hell was going on. Wasn’t everyone always telling him he needed to communicate more? Damn it, he was communicating.
“You couldn’t have sent me a text letting me know that?”
Abby wiped her forehead with the edge of the blanket. “Tinker, I have been thrown up on twice. I have one clingy kid that would barely let me pee by myself without throwing a fit and another kid pretending like they didn’t need me at all. So no, my first thought between tag-teaming bouts of vomiting and diarrhea was not to let you know I couldn’t talk.”
Now he felt like an ass. But it didn’t explain her complete lack of communication. She could have texted him at least once to let him know the kids were sick.
“So it has nothing to do with me ghosting you before?”
She looked at him like he’d sprouted a third head. Hell, maybe he had. He was so far out of his depth he might as well have been in the middle of the ocean.
“No, it has nothing to do with you ghosting me before. I’ve been knee-deep in sick kids for the last… I don’t even know what day it is.”
