“Knox—”
“Babe, I get why you did what you did,” he stated. “Him? A bud? Hell, even just a colleague, but he isn’t just that. He’s a friend. I don’t get it, but I do get that it’s not okay.”
I kind of understood this.
If Knox had done the same with Shanti, or Gem, or Joey…
Actually, I totally understood this because if that happened, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to forgive them.
But I was part of that mess, and I hated the idea that my part in it might end a friendship between two people I cared a great deal about.
“Can you at least talk to him?” I asked quietly.
“I can at least do that, honey,” he answered quietly.
“Thanks.”
He smiled at me.
We ate our muffins and sipped our coffee.
Good news: once we unwrapped them, even I, not remotely a medical professional, could see his wounds were healing nicely.
Better news: I’d forgotten how fun it was to take a shower with Knox.
Not as good news, but still nice news: making meal plans with my man was da bomb.
SEVENTEEN
MIXED BAG
The Avenging Angels Headquarters were four storage units a short drive away from Oasis Square.
Three of them were taken up by our work vehicles (a Mercedes sedan, a Honda Accord and a Kia Sportage), since it wasn’t smart to do our business in cars people could trace the license plates to.
The last unit was where things got serious (in other words where we plotted, but mostly just hung out).
In it was a big red curved couch we could all fit on (yes, all of us) and a desk with a speaker smack dab in the middle of it so Arthur could talk to us.
We had another desk, a secretary’s one, in a corner, on top of which was a computer hooked up to high-speed broadband.
A white board was mounted on the back wall behind the big desk, a kickass angel statue sat in another corner, and portraits of each of us hung on the walls all around.
Rounding this out was a beverage fridge, fun glasses and straws, and making it all official, we had a laser pointer.
After dropping Knox (early, he wanted to get there first, wholly because he didn’t want Cheyenne to see me dropping him, and I approved of this play), I rolled up to find all the Angels there.
I barely made it through the big open door before Harlow was on me, giving me a hug.
When she pulled away, she oozed, “I love this. You look so happy.”
I loved it too, because I was so happy.
After giving her a smile I hoped wasn’t love-loopy (but I feared it was when her expression got brighter and happier), I moved further into the unit, heading toward the beverage fridge, taking in the fact we had a visitor, kind of.
Clarice was sitting in a chair none of us ever sat in. The one behind the desk.
I couldn’t see what was on her lower half, but her upper half was covered in a mink-colored asymmetrical cashmere sweater that fell off her shoulder and was giving me life, and I didn’t even own it.
