Page 38 of Rogue Wave

Why the hell wouldn’t that man just leave me alone?

“Hank, why would I invite him over while I was working? He’s lying. I made it very clear that I did not want to see him again.”

I moved back to the tank to drop in the remainder of Nigel’s food, tilting my head so I could rest my phone between my right shoulder and my ear.

“I figured, but I needed to verify before I took this any further,” Hank replied.

What did that mean?

Before I could ask, a cold, wet, and slimy sensation hit my left arm, causing me to gasp loudly. I looked down at the culprit and yelled, “Nigel, I swear to God if you touch me like that one more time, I will slap you!”

He released me, returning down into his tank, but he splashed me in the process, further pissing me off.

“What did you just say?” Hank asked.

I huffed out a loud breath and shook the water off myself.

“It’s nothing,” I grumbled because I didn’t have time to explain. Instead, I threw some shrimp on the other side of the tank so Nigel would eat those and leave me alone for a few minutes.

“Who’s Nigel?” he asked, all grumpy and pissed off.

I sighed. Apparently, he wasn’t going to let this go. “He’s the biggest pain in my ass at work because he gets handsy with me when I’m alone cleaning the tanks or prepping food… Well, handsy probably isn’t the best choice of word, but⁠—”

His rough and indignant voice cut me off. “Hazel, that’s considered sexual assault, and you can…”

I was about to interrupt him and explain further when a slimy tentacle latched onto my left forearm again and pulled…hard. I yelped and my arm jerked, causing my phone to fall out of my hand and plop into the tank. I watched in slow motion as it sank to the bottom before I could reach for it.

“Ugggggh. Seriously?” I growled and then yelled, “We just talked about this. I’m gonna have to get a new phone, asshole!”

Nigel seemed completely unfazed by the fact that he’d just ruined my nearly thousand-dollar phone. Yes, I had insurance, but that didn’t make a new phone magically appear at this very moment. Nigel released me and scurried off to go investigate the new expensive toy that had just dropped into his home.

Thoroughly pissed off, I closed the hatch of his tank so he couldn’t escape and went to find Vivi so I could tell her I dropped my phone.

We often texted at work when we needed help, and I didn’t want her to think I was ignoring her.

I found her back behind the eel tank and was giving her the full play-by-play of what had happened—both with Nigel and also Rourke—when our security guard called over the walkie-talkies that the police were here and needed to know where I was immediately.

I replied, letting them know my location, and looked at Vivi with concern.

“Do you think Rourke did something worse?” she asked me.

I shrugged. “I have no idea.”

A minute later, Hank came charging in with one of our guards, fury written all over his face.

Oh, no.

He walked straight up to me, not paying one bit of attention to anyone else in the room. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I replied. “Sorry, I got disconnected. My phone fell into the tank when Nigel grabbed my arm.”

“Take me to see this Nigel guy,” he demanded. “Now.”

Vivi let out a snort beside me as she realized the same thing I did.

“Umm, Hank, Nigel is⁠—”

“Hazel, just take me to him,” he ordered, and I smiled.