“Well, then. Guess I can chalk this little episode up to be careful what you wish for.”
He said this mostly to himself. And with that ironic, cryptic little statement, he turned around and headed down the stairs.
But she didn’t hear that fourth step groan.
He must know that he needed to skip it.
Mac had in fact gotten into the house by shoving a window in the living room open wide enough to squeeze through. It hadn’t been easy, though.Thatparticular window frame was going to need scraping and sanding and repainting, if she was serious about getting the place ship-shape before she sold it. He wondered if Avalon intended to attempt to undertake that particularly nasty job all on her own. It was nothing but methodical, relentless grunt work, all dust and splinters.
But then, scraping layers off things was never painless.
It was every bit as beautiful as he remembered.
“Hey, Cat,” he said to The Cat, who appeared and fell into a long-legged stride alongside him, as if they were a couple of rogue detectives out on a case.
But he was, in fact, feeling a little subdued.
He just... found it less and less easy to leave her every time he was in her presence. Even when he couldn’t get away fast enough.
Even though every encounter seemed to flay a fine layer fromhim.
He knew how that kind of work could be a very effective form of purging and self-flagellation. But he could tell she was already stiff from it. She wasn’t a common farmer like he was, used to laboring away.
He smiled crookedly at himself. Helikedbeing who he was.
Didn’t he?
But there had to be some other reason she was here all by herself, going at that huge house.
When he got home, he followed a hunch and whipped open his laptop and navigated to SilliPutty, scrolling through items.
There was a little jab in the area of his heart when he saw it.
Sources tell us that Corbin Bergson is flailing at the helm of GradYouAte in the wake of CEO Avalon Harwood’s sudden mysterious leave of absence. Could the abrupt departure of a certain intern be related?
Mac leaned back against the chair and blew out a breath.
Well, well, well.
He was both grateful and irritated on Avalon’s behalf that someone on her staff was loose-lipped or bribable. The notion that she might be hurting, and not just thanks to wallpaper scraping, bothered him a lot, though.
He mulled.
He knew what hereallywanted to do right now. And wasn’t he a guy who got what he wanted?
And yet he couldn’t remember his pulse going like this the last time he went after something he wanted.
Maybe the stakes just hadn’t been high enough before.
