“Well, then you’re going to have to convince him to want you too, or I will have to officially start judging you for the first time in like… ever. You can’t be a vigilante who kills child abusers and then turn around and abuse innocent people yourself, Cal. It’s hypocritical.”
I narrowed my eyes on her. “How did you get so wise?” I asked, getting up and crossing over to her side of the room. Grabbing her head, I tilted it to the side so I could check her ears.
“Do you just stuff the knowledge in through here? I know you’re not learning this much from reading. All you read is smut.”
She laughed and tried to pull back, but I started tickling her until she squealed. I let her kick me away and grinned down at her.
She wrinkled her nose at me and flipped me off, making me chuckle.
“Alright so, you think I should go back?”
“What, like, to his house? Maybe you should text him first.”
“I don’t have his number.”
She rolled her eyes at me. “Please.You’re telling me the big bad mercenary can’t get his number?Icould probably get his number. I bet it’s listed on his website.”
I flicked her nose. “See?Wise.” I smirked before whipping out my phone. She was right, of course. Right there on theContact Uspage of Fairview Funeral Services was both the business number and a fucking mobile number right under his handsome businessman headshot.
Good lord. If he ever let me within ten feet of him again, we would need to have a conversation about minimizing our digital footprint.
I mean, yes, I get it. You own a business and want to be easily found online… but you list your personalmobilenumber on the contact page?
I tutted my tongue. He was basicallybeggingfor dick pics.
Unable to contain the shit-eating grin that was spreading across my face, I glanced back up at Naomi.
“You going to be okay if I head back out for a bit?” I asked, and she nodded, reaching for the remote to the TV and her e-reader, which were lying next to her.
“Sure, I get so much more reading done when you’re not here to pester me,” she snarked, and I laughed.
“Alright. Text me if you need me. And lock the doors!” I shouted over my shoulder as I headed back out.
“I always do, you mother hen!”
I smirked. “Loooove youuu!”
Pausing by the door, I waited to see if she would say it back, but she just giggled in her adorable Naomi way.
“Get out of here, you goofball. Go get your man back.”
For a moment, I felt the usual swell of disappointment and worried that maybe my motherhadbeen right.
Maybe I really was the devil, and that was why no one ever said they loved me back.
But then, my busy brain focused on two words she had said that made me forget all about my stupid trauma.
My man.
She called Ryanmyman.I could get used to that.
I would text Ryan first, but I was sure he would probably ignore me. Naomi was right; I needed to talk to him about Caleb regardless, so I would try to do things the right way this time. But if he didn’t answer, I might need to commit one more B&E before I forced myself to back off…
This was probably my last chance to convince him to let me in, and I wasn’t going to waste it.
Cleaning up the mess Cal had left me with was oddly… calming. It was a lot easier to pretend that the man on my table was just another client without Cal’s domineering ass leering over me.
The shameful evidence of my orgasm had been easy enough to get rid of. Most of it had hit the plastic that was still clinging to the corpse, so once I disposed of that, it was like it never happened.
