Chapter Twenty-Two

“You goddamn idiot.”

Tom plastered his forehead to the cool steel of our agency’s door, closing his eyes. His breathing was labored, and he looked ready to kill someone.

Me. I was that someone. And I deserved a good beating for what I’d done.

Leaning against my desk with my arms crossed, I let him blow off some steam.

“You put your client at risk, let her out of your sight, and kept the entire mess from me. I can’t believe you.”

He pushed off of the door, pivoting into the common area of the agency. He kicked a trashcan. It rolled along the floor, spitting crumpled papers and chewed gum.

With calm I didn’t feel, I noted, “You were the genius who insisted I take the job.”

“I didn’t know your beef with the Russians was an ongoing matter!” Tom threw his arms up in the air, shouting.

“Neither did I,” I flat-out lied.

“And now she fired you.”

That one sliced through my chest like a rusty knife.

“We’ve decided it was best if we parted ways. She won’t say a word to her father about it. He’ll think it was just the mafia being the mafia. She’s high profile, loaded, sought-after—”

“Something’s not making sense here.” He raised his hand, stopping me midsentence.

I arched an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“You’ve never kept shit like this from me. Ever.” Tom stalked toward me, his eyes zinging with determination. “You’re not giving me the whole story. Why did you keep it to yourself? Why didn’t you tell me about the Russians right away?”

Because I couldn’t stay away from a certain Thorne Princess.

“I can handle my own problems.”

“Bullshit!” He slammed his palms against my chest, pushing me. The desk scraped behind me. “Give me the missing piece.”

“There’s no missing piece.”

“I’ll go and ask Miss Thorne herself. She’ll answer, too. That girl couldn’t lie if her life depended on it,” Tom warned.

He wasn’t wrong. Hallie was pure as fresh-fallen snow. Still, what were the chances he’d hurl his ass all the way to California just to ask her? I stared at him flatly, calling his bluff.

Tom waltzed over to our secretary’s desk, ripping a Post-it note from a pile and scribbling something, slapping it against her screen.

Get me on a flight to L.A. Today.

T

He picked up the phone and made a call.

“What’re you doing?” I asked tersely. I didn’t have patience for this shit. I was tired, agitated, and above all, still digesting the fact that Hallie had thrown me out of her life.

“Calling Holmes’ daughter. At the funeral—which you bailed on, by the fucking way—I promised I’d give her a call if I’m in Cali again. She wants to talk about her dad.”

The asshole meant business. He was going to jet to California and hear from my former employee how I’d fucked her.

It was time to face the music, even if it sounded like a cat in heat.

“I fucked her,” I spat out finally.

Tom froze, his phone still pinned to his ear. I heard a few, faint hellos from the other line. Slowly—very fucking slowly—he lowered his phone, killed the call, and tucked it into the inner pocket of his blazer.

“You fucked the ward?”

Hearing the words flung back at me, they sounded all wrong. I waved my hand dismissively.

“It was more of an affair.”

“You don’t do affairs. You do contracts and NDAs and rape fantasies. All the sordid shit.”

“People change.”

“People—yes. Not you.” His hands quivered with anger and he balled them into fists by his sides. He snarled, animal-like, making his way to me.

I stood straighter, my muscles tensing in case we had to rough it out. Wouldn’t be the first time. We were forced to do this a lot as kids. Solve our disagreements with our fists.

“Are you insinuating I’m incapable of developing feelings?” I drawled.

“I’m not insinuating, it’s a proven fact. I’d put money on it.”

But he wouldn’t win. Not this time. Because I did, in fact, have feelings. Lots of them. I felt angry and out of place. Confused, too. It was the first time a woman had kicked me out of her bed—out of her place. A woman who, specifically, I wasn’t done with.

No matter. It was supposed to be good that Hallie and I were now on opposite sides of the continent. Nothing would’ve come out of our little fling.

So why did I feel like such a goddamn mess?

Realizing Tom was waiting for an answer, I finally said, “Look, it doesn’t even matter. Whatever happened, happened, and it’s behind us now. Anthony will never know. She’d never tell him. Schedule a call with McAfee. I’ll explain the Russian kidnap blunder. If anything, it’s a good thing.” I pushed Tom out of my personal space, striding toward the wall-to-wall window overlooking Chicago’s skyline and The Loop.

“Good?” he snorted out behind me. “Walk me through your logic, Lockwood.”

I reached for the bottle of cognac in the Ralph Lauren liquor cabinet, pouring myself a generous drink. “The fact of the matter is, she was kidnapped, and it took me less than two hours to find her and save her. In the process, I also got Kozlov and company locked up. Two birds, one stone. McAfee will be impressed by that.”

“Will he also be impressed with you getting fired?”

I took a swig of my drink, rolling it in my mouth. “No one has to know I was terminated. As far as McAfee is concerned, we shifted things around. I decided to go back to the main office now that the threat’s been removed, and we assigned someone else to the job.”

“There’s no one else on the job,” Tom pointed out.

I turned to give him one of my special, you-don’t-fucking-say looks.

“I hadn’t noticed,” I deadpanned.

“Asshole.” Tom clenched his teeth. “Fine. But only if we get Max back on the job. I don’t want to lie.”

I shook my head. “There’s zero chance of Hallie letting any of us near her ever again.”

And rightly so. I’d fucked up royally with her. I was lucky I didn’t have a lawsuit the size of Belgium waiting for me right now.

“No bodyguard—no McAfee.” Tom crossed his arms over his chest.

“Are you kidding me?” I snarled. “You promised. That was the only reason I went out there in the first place.”

He raised his palms up. “Let’s settle. We’ll put surveillance on her without telling her, to make sure she doesn’t run into any trouble. Put our minds at ease, and we don’t have to ask her for favors. I understand how tricky it might be, to ask her for a solid considering your…indiscretion.”

Perfect solution. One that would put my mind at ease, too. Yet, I couldn’t fucking do it. Couldn’t bring myself to go against Hallie’s specific request not to be followed, just to save my own ass. I didn’t care to think about what it meant. I just knew I couldn’t do this to her.

“No.” I hung my head down.

“No?” Tom echoed, raising an eyebrow.

“No,” I said. “I can’t have her followed. She said it’s over. We need to respect that.”

“Since when do you respect other people’s rules?” Tom spat out. “Who even are you?”

Both were good questions, and I didn’t have an answer for either of them. All I knew was I wanted this conversation over. I walked over to my office, retrieving my wallet, keys, and laptop before walking out the door.

“Secure the meeting with McAfee. I want to talk to Thorne and have him introduce us to whoever we need in D.C.”

I dipped out of the office, slamming the door behind me.

That night, I stumbled into a bar near my apartment and drank myself half to death.

I showed up at work the next morning, after a CrossFit session, showered, dapper, and ready to conquer the world. Pressing hard on all work-related issues, I convinced myself that diligence was all it took. Twenty-four hours to get Hallie Thorne out of my system. Just like a bad stomach bug.

She was no longer my job, my problem, or a part of my life.

The plan went well until the clock hit seven and everyone left the office for home. I went straight to the bar. Again.

Other people—normal people—had someone waiting for them at home. A spouse, a girlfriend, a kid, a goddamn pet. For the first time in my life, there was someone I actually wanted to see, and I couldn’t. The only time I didn’t want solitude, I had been forced to have it.

The next day was the same. I functioned. I attended meetings. I assigned agents to cases. I briefed. I courted. I even got McAfee on the phone and, as expected, he seemed pleased with how I’d handled the Hallie Thorne kidnapping case. A case that was now appearing less on newspaper headlines and popping up more on pages four and five, right next to the grocery coupons and adult incontinence diaper ads.

After all, she was fine.

Iwas fine.

So fine, in fact, that I decided to visit the bar again after my conversation with McAfee, to celebrate. McAfee had promised to connect me with Thorne’s former security firm to talk about potential clients for my cybersecurity venture.

One week turned into two.

Two into three.

Before I knew it, I’d clocked in a whole month.

At some point around the two-week mark, I stopped hitting the bars and started hitting the liquor store. No point in shooting the shit with bartenders or sidestepping horny housewives looking for dirty fucks while I got good and hammered.

One day, I looked at the calendar and realized I’d drunk myself numb for thirty days straight. I briefly considered throwing my own ass into rehab for a spell. But that would be the smart thing to do. The right thing to do.

I went cold turkey instead.

I threw all the bottles of whiskey and cognac into the trash. Doubled-down on the CrossFit. Cleaned up my act.

Sober, with a new haircut, and frequenting Tom’s Brady Bunch home for goddamn family dinners, I finally made it.

I stopped thinking about Hallie.

I stopped thinking about the day she told me to go fuck myself.

And started living my life.

It was really that simple.

See, asshole? You can do anything you put your mind to. You are, after all, Ransom Lockwood.