“God damn, Austin!” Eli shouts from somewhere outside the fray.
“Hell no, you crazy bitch!” A potted plant comes crashing down splitting over Michelle and dumping wet dirt over us.
“Stand back, Miss Cole.” Eli grabs my girl moving her back so he can peel an unconscious Michelle from on top of me.
“James, are you alright?” Casey leans down, her hands covering my face and inspecting my body.
“You saved me.” Looking up into her dark eyes I feel weightless from her love.
“No, you saved me.” She says coming in close to kiss me. Her lips tremble underneath mine and I know I’m never letting her go.
“Nooo!” Michelle screeches struggling in Eli’s grip.
Casey yells at her husking away from me so she can help me stand up. “Shut up, you wicked witch. This man is mine, get your own!”
“I’ll take care of this.” Eli says pulling her away toward the elevator.
Tucker is on his phone calling the police to report what happened.
“How did you know to come up here?” Casey asks helping me hobble over to my office.
“I actually didn’t. I retained Eli after the show in LA, but this, this I stumbled on thank god.” I tell her.
“I guess I didn’t put together her dislike of me for that level of hate.”
“I took it for granted. Now we have to get Elroy round up as well. I heard what she said about the fire.”
“Yeah. Unbelievable. Not only were they trying to hurt me, but my innocent neighbors too.”
“Come here.” I hold her close breathing in her scent and grateful she’s okay. Things could have been so much worse, I was grateful they weren’t.
I check my phone from my pocket finding several messages from Eli. All of them in the same vein of saying: pick up the phone, it’s the assistant. “Huh, well Eli figured it out.”
“I’m glad.” She exhales deeply and I agree.
“Me too, let’s go home to Charlie.” I kiss her forehead and we go downstairs to a mass of police lights and officers entering the building. I guess home will have to wait a little longer.
43
Casey
“Sound Check. Sound Check.” I give Tucker the thumbs up sign and adjust my headphones. “Hello and good morning Philadelphia. This is the Sound Wave Z107, the heart and soul of Philly and today’s number one radio station. Let’s get rolling.”
It’s been six week
s since Michelle-Crazy-Pants and Elroy- the-Idiot have been arrested and charged. Michelle is currently on holiday at the psych ward and Elroy was considered a flight risk and denied bail. The little issue of setting my apartment building on fire sent the judge over the top. I’m finally feeling good knowing there won’t be any stalker issues, no calls, no letter, and no weird shit in the mailroom.
Tucker hits the light letting me know we have a caller on the external line. “Hello, thanks for calling, this is Casey.”
“Good morning beautiful, I was wondering if the offer still stands for dinner and dessert tonight?” I chuckle because I know its James being a smart ass. Okay, so he’s the one weird outlier I’m totally fine with.
He is clearly not supposed to call his own station and solicit me for dinner. It’s actually in a legal agreement he signed with his board of trustees since my suspension was lifted. Doing this costs him a nice ten grand which he has to donate to charity each time he does it.
I never claimed he was a good listener.
“I don’t know boss, I’m kind of on the air right now, but I’ll be happy to get back to you after the show.” It’s no secret in Philadelphia that James and I are dating, but he still likes to embarrass me from time to time with his radio pranks. Pranks that his board of trustees seem to continue overlooking when the ratings come out each quarter. There’s a reason we’re number one and I can’t guarantee it’s not because of our on air shenanigans and public relationship.
First it was a phone tap, and then it was his announcement at the radio music festival. He doesn’t know when to stop, even with a hefty fine, and part of me is glad he never did.