“The man didn’t give his name,” Mathewson sighs. “So even though we know it was hacked, we don’t know who. All we have is this.”
He places a playing card on my desk, except that instead of a heart or a club, there’s a small drawing of a builder’s helmet drawn onto the paper, with the words beneath, Hardhat, call only when absolutely necessary.
I gesture to the cellphone number.
“I’m guessing it’s dead?”
“Yep.”
“Shit.”
Mathewson sucks in a short breath. “Yep.”
“Okay,” I say, pacing up and down. “I want you to hire a private detective, somebody veteran, somebody who’s spent their whole life working in this city. Make sure they know the local gangs, because the motherfuckers behind this, there’s no damn way they’d get their hands dirty, not with blackmail. No, not if they made one of ours do it through sheer brute force, then they hired a criminal and he might be known to a vet.”
“You got it, boss,” he says, standing up and taking out his cellphone already. “You’re thinking Hardhat is a nickname?”
I nod. “Sounds like it.”
“We’ll get to the bottom of this,” he says, and then strides from the office.
I drop into my seat and try to lose myself in work for a while. A light drizzle falls against the wide, tall windows, distorting the skyline, and imitating my thoughts.
Hazy, confused.
Why did she run out like that?
The meal went well, we bantered, we had a good goddamn time.
Perhaps she could sense that the kiss wasn’t just a kiss, that I wanted – fuck that, needed – to take things to the next level.
But then she did, too. I could read her body. I could scent her womb filling the night air, screaming at me to take her, to fill her until she was overflowing with my seed, my seed that belongs to her and her alone.
She wanted it.
And yet still she ran.
Or am I wrong? Have I imagined this connection?
No.
It’s something else.
I just fucking know it.
I sit down and pick up my phone, calling through to Natalie’s office.
“Hey, bro,” she says. “You’re going to ask me if I’m seeing Melody today.”
I smile despite myself.
“How the hell did you know that?”
“Because you went on a date last night and you’re a man.”
“And?”
I hear her grinning. “And men always need their hands held in matters of love, dumbass. If you haven’t heard from her, go and see her. There’s this really awesome thing men and women sometimes do. It’s called talking. You might want to try it.”
I lean back in my chair, glad Natalie’s on the phone and not in here so she can’t see the uncertainty in my expression. Not uncertainty about my carnal possessive need to claim every inch of Melody, to strip her naked and palm the gradations of her flesh, to soak her in my come and leave her aching and begging for more.
No, I could never be uncertain about that.
But I’ve spent my entire life focusing on my business, not talking to women. I’ve had chances, of course, but never any want. Now my want is overflowing and I know that if I don’t find out why Melody stormed out, I’ll never forgive myself.
“Mason?” Natalie says. “Are you there?”
“Yeah, just thinking,” I sigh. “Jesus, Natalie, I don’t even know how to explain it, but I really think Melody might be the one.”
Natalie gasps. “Holy crap. Are you serious?”
“Yeah.”
“I mean … you’ve mentioned over the years that you’d just know if you saw her, but I guess I just thought that was you being you if you know what I mean. You’ve always been certain in business. I supposed I thought it was just a kind of extension of that, you know?”
“It’s not. It’s the real deal.”
“Then that’s all the more reason to go talk to her, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” I say, sitting up. “You’re right.”
Because this is the future mother of my children we’re talking about.
I ride one of my sedans across the city to the Eternal Bond offices, because their windows are tinted and the last thing I need right now is to deal with the vulture-like press. I’d hate to expose Melody to them, to have her infected with the bullshit that sometimes characterizes my CEO lifestyle. I sent out a decoy Lamborghini, driven by one of the interns, and predictably the hovering paparazzi swarmed that, leaving me free to glide away.
The Eternal Bond office is a small storefront with a mural of a lady in a wedding dress painted on the glass window. Inside, it smells of scented candles, and the glazed windows cause the light to dance pink and red.
My breath catches when I spot Melody behind the counter, biting her bottom lip as she types something on a keyboard. Her typing stops mid-tempo when she looks up at the sound of the bell above the door.
Her eyes widen.
She shakes slightly, and fucking hell, she’s only wearing a pale blue t-shirt and her breasts jiggle so alluringly already my manhood is instantly a thrumming impulse in my suit trousers.
“Mason,” she mutters.
“I had to come and see you,” I growl, striding to the counter and looking down at her, her hair tied in a ponytail made for grabbing, a readymade handle to guide her to all the sweetest sinful places. “Is Gertrude in?”
“No,” she says. “Why?”
I smirk like the savage fucking beast she turns me into.
“Because I want to know if we’re alone.”
Her lips twitch into a glorious smile at that. She stands up, nodding toward the back room, which is filled with cardboard boxes and photos of weddings.
“I can make us a coffee or something if you want?”
“Sure,” I say. “Lead the way, beautiful.”
“You’re unstoppable, aren’t you?”
“Always,” I smirk.
I watch as she walks into the back office. She’s wearing jeans today, baggy, but that just highlights her natural curvaceous sublimity all the more. I need to feel through that denim, searching for the flesh beneath, flesh that needs
