Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

CALVIN

The duffle bag had the basics. Plain black t-shirts that probably came in a pack of three, cargo pants that were way too big for me, a windbreaker and a cap, along with essentials like toiletries and underwear. It was whatever, but I kind of wished I could sneak home for my own clothes. I felt more like myself in my own clothes.

I'd never been the shy type, so I didn't think anything about changing my shirt in front of the two bounty hunters. A plain black t-shirt was better than the button up, at least, so I was happy to get out of it. It wasn't until the older guy snickered that I realized something was up. I looked over my shoulder, frowning at the duo.

"What?"

Kiara scowled at the man, and he put his hands up in surrender, still chuckling to himself.

"Nothing. Hurry up. We need to get moving."

Wishful thinking had me imagining that Kiara's cheeks were pink. I wasn't going to get my hopes up again that she might be interested. She never was. It didn't automatically make my crush disappear, but I had enough on my plate to deal with for now.

Thankfully, the trip to the hotel was uneventful. We parked in the employee lot and someone brought us in through the back to the top floor. The room we got wasn't a suite or anything, it had the two beds, a tv, and the bathroom, but there was a decent view of the city. Not that I was allowed to enjoy it. Kiara jerked the curtains closed and told me to stay away from them. Then she left. With no more than a warning to not leave the room and to not call anyone, she walked out. I had no other option but to settle on the bed and wait.

It took maybe two hours before I was bored out of my skull. I wasn't this kind of person. I didn't sit around watching tv all day. Even if there was something decent on. I figured out how to log onto my Netflix account, but even my favorite shows couldn't keep my attention. I wanted to do something. There were no video games here, no access to computers so I could talk to my friends. I paced the room, peeking out the window to see if I could see the parking lot from here. I couldn't, and I knew if Kiara found me near the window, she'd ream me out. If she even came back. Oh, crap, what if she didn't? What if she just dropped me off and left me here alone? I was a social person. I'd die from loneliness and boredom before she even found the asshole looking for me.

Before I could completely spiral, she came back, this time with two boxes of pizza and a few bags. I'd skipped breakfast because I was busy getting ready for my interview and didn't think it was a good idea to order room service for lunch, so I was starving. I shifted from foot to foot, freezing when she smirked at me.

"I take it you're hungry?"

It was a tease, but it was sort of a smile and that urge to get on my knees and worship her came back full force. Maybe the boredom killed my filter because I couldn't stop the words from flying out of my mouth.

"Holy hell, you're gorgeous."

She came to an abrupt halt, and to my great delight, her cheeks tinted pink. She looked around, confused and embarrassed. "Have you been raiding the mini bar or something?"

"Nope." Probably would've been smart, though. At least then I'd be able to relax. I made a mental note to check it out later.

It took her a second, but she shook off my comment and put the pizza on the desk against the wall. "I brought food. Pizza for dinner, but I also picked up some snacks and stuff like that. My boss's friend gave me his number for ordering room service. He's the only one we can trust to bring food up here, so don't call down randomly for shit. Got it?"

"Uh huh. You got large pizzas, right? Because I can eat a whole one on my own."

She frowned, looking me over. "How? You don't weigh anything."

I shrugged. "I have a high metabolism. No more talking until I get food."

Her lips twitched like she was going to smile again and I made it my mission from then on to figure out any way to make her laugh. Life goals were good, especially in weird situations like this. Make the hot bounty hunter laugh and maybe she'd give me a shot. A guy could dream anyway.

"It's not that hard. Why are they crying?" Kiara demanded.

I snorted, talking around a mouthful of food. "He's afraid of heights. And an actor. They aren't exactly special forces."

She'd complained about my first choice in shows when we sat down to eat. It took some trial and error, but we eventually found something we were both interested in. I mean, who doesn't like a show where famous people try to do the shit the special forces can do and fail miserably?

"It's just rappelling! My nephew could probably do that, and he wouldn't even cry about it."

Whipping my head around, I frowned. "Wait. Your nephew is real?"

She raised an eyebrow at me. "Yeah? Why?"

"I thought you just made that up to hang around the shop," I admitted. "Kinda thought you were a secret nerd, too embarrassed to admit it, so you were making up excuses or whatever."

She snorted, shaking her head as she dipped her crust into the extra sauce on the side. "If you want to sell a lie, you need to stick as close to the truth as possible. I do have a nephew. He is eight, and he likes to read. But I wasn't there for him. He doesn't actually like me."

"Why not? Oh, did you pretend you were interested in something he likes and then dash all his hopes away because of a job?"

I ducked with a laugh when she threw a balled up napkin at me.

"No, asshole. He and his mom… They were in a messed up situation. It was basically a cult. They just got out recently and my sister's recovery is… slow. My nephew doesn't like when I push her. He's protective of her and he thinks I'm too harsh. We butt heads a lot."

That was oddly honest, and I sobered pretty quickly. "That's messed up. Are they okay?"

She shrugged, her eyes averted. "I don't know. I haven't been home in a while. When I was there, it felt like we'd go forward a little and then back again. It was frustrating."

"Well, that's normal," I said around another bite of pizza. I was hungry, sue me. "Recovery isn't a straight line. There are a lot of ups and downs, some plateaus. It'd be nice if it was as simple as getting a little better every day, but people aren't like that. They have good days and bad days."

"How do you know all this?"

"Took some psych classes at the local college, trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life. My mom is the typical tiger mom, wanted me to be a doctor, but I wasn't interested in dealing with whiny sick people all day. I figured psych would be easier. The classes were fine, but I couldn't really get into it. I got bored eventually." I shrugged. My mom was still pissed when I dropped out of college my second year. To me, it was a waste of money. It felt a little weird deciding what I wanted to do with the rest of my life so young, and nothing kept my interest that long. I didn't want to spend another two and a half years working for an expensive piece of paper I might not use.

She looked thoughtful, and we fell into a comfortable silence watching the show, aside from random comments about how easy she thought the tasks were and how shitty the actors were at doing them. It was fun, and once we found some common ground, she was easy to talk to. It gave me an idea of how to get close to her. The plan wasn't well thought out, and probably not the best thing to focus on while I was stuck here, but what else did I have to do aside from seducing the bounty hunter protecting me?

"Oh, come on. It's not that hard!" she complained.

"Not everyone is as perfect as you are. Maybe cut them some slack."

That time, she didn't blush. She gave me a flat look instead. The blush only came out when I grinned and winked at her. Score one for me.

She attempted to ignore it, pointing at the screen again. "You're saying you can't do that?"

"Never said that. But I started doing parkour in high school. Balancing like that would be easy for me. I could probably do it walking on my hands."

"You could not," she argued. "It's not stable."

I shrugged and feigned nonchalance. I was playing it up, it probably wasn't as easy as it looked, but I wanted to impress her. She crossed her arms definitely, jerking her chin at me.

"Prove it. Walk on your hands for more than a few feet without losing your balance."

Well, that was an easy challenge. I dusted my hands off, moving to the door of the room. "From here to the window, then?"

She nodded once, a smirk pulling at her lips. "When you fall, I'm gonna laugh my ass off. You were flagging, running for less than five minutes this morning."

"Mean," I said, pointing at her. "I was panicking, and I got a stitch. This is totally different."

She still looked smug, so I decided to show off a little. I walked across the room on my hands with ease and back until I was beside the desk. Then I shifted to one hand and balanced like that for a minute just to rub it in her face a little. When I stood again, she was staring at where my shirt had ridden up and a big grin crossed my face.

Maybe I had a chance after all.