I sighed and turned towards the hallway.
“Good morning, Mr. Alexander,” Sam said to Cane’s back as he followed me out. Cane ignored her.
We were silent as we marched down the hall. It was never good when Cane was riled up first thing in the morning. It just made for a long ass day.
I took my seat in my office and Cane shut the door behind him.
“What the fuck is that sitting at the front desk?” Cane asked, his hand on my filing cabinet.
“Sam needed a job—”
“Good for her. Why is she here?”
“She’s filling in for Lucy.”
“Are you kiddingme?”
“No.”
Cane blew out a breath and sat across from me. “You know she’s certi-fucking-fiable, right?”
“Cane...”
He propped one ankle on the other knee and scratched at his chin. He eyed me curiously. “There are seven different personality types of women. Every woman will fall into one of those seven if you pay enough attention to figure it out. Apparently with Sam, you can’t do that, so I’m gonna break it down for you. She, my friend, falls into the category ofCrazy As Hell.”
“She’s not crazy.”
“Oh, she certainly is. I know you don’t see it because of all that shit that happened, but she’s nuts. Do you know how many times I could’ve tapped that over the years? Hundreds, Max. But I didn’t and you know me—there were times in my life where I fucked anything and everything.” He leaned forward. “But I never fucked her.”
“No one is asking you to do anything to her. We had a job opening and she needed a job. It’s the nice thing to do.”
Cane dipped his chin and looked sternly at me. “You do realize that you don’t owe her jack shit, right?”
I rolled my eyes. “This has nothing to do with that.”
“The fuck it doesn’t. You still think you need to help her put her life back together. She’s a fuckin’ head case, Quinn, and that has nothing to do with you. It never has had anything to do with you.”
“Cane—”
“Nope. Not done,” he cut me off. “Most of what that girl says is garbage. I know she has you wrapped around her little finger and I get that. I do. You’re a nice guy and you always try to do the right thing. But it makes you a sitting duck to people who want to manipulate you. And she wrote the book on that.”
“I know you don’t like her. I get it. But it’s just a job. What can it hurt?”
“It better not hurt anything. I don’t have the time or the energy to deal with anything that crazy bitch comes up with. Between Jada and Dan, I have a full plate.”
I rested my elbows on my desk, exhausted before eight in the morning. “I heard he was in this morning. How’d that go?”
“I didn’t kill him.”
“That’s a point in your favor.”
“Yeah, well, he had a little fit about not getting paid but Hilah was right. She deducted the balance he owed us back for the advance he took when he got married thatyouapproved. Danny Boy forgot about that, conveniently. He tossed a few threats and more than a few profanities, but I think he got the picture.”
Cane stood quickly and walked past my desk to the window, looking across the parking lot. We watched Dan get into his green Chevy and speed out of the parking lot.
“There’s one crazy down.” He looked at me and shook his head. “One to go.”
Kari
