“I’ll take you shopping in the morning,” I say.
Her eyebrows raise. “You’ll do what?”
“You heard me. Now let me work. You’re always interrupting things.”
“Fine.” She stands up. Just as she gets to the doorway, she turns back. “How long are you staying?” Her brown eyes seem uninterested in the answer but I know she’s hopeful. We’re the same. Our lives intertwined.
I haven’t decided yet if I’m staying. Living here once was comfortable enough, but I prefer to be alone. Leaving V here to the wolves offends the hell out of me. But V will never be free if she keeps running. I know she never wanted to come back. But there are demons we all have to face.
“Until I get paid,” I say honestly.
She nods, and disappears into the darkness. It takes me at least an hour to get my head back in the game after she’s gone.
This is why I live alone.
Shopping with Vis what I thought it would be. Torture.
She adorns these tight t-shirts and short dresses and expects me to have an opinion. I don’t. She can wear what she likes. I pay for everything on expenses and carry her bags. V is like a woman possessed. She doesn’t stop, not even to take a break.
“Have you never been shopping before?” I ask her.
She snorts. “Not with you and your endless credit card. No.”
When we get back, I dump her bags in her room and leave her to fuss over her new clothes. I need to work. I’ve let things slide since I was stalking V. A lot of clients are pissed that I haven’t returned their calls.
V thinks I’m rich.
I am.
But that’s because I work.
In the afternoon, Adrien Harper Black video calls me without warning. It pisses me off because I’m not ready. He likes it that way. V hates him because he abused her mother until she tried to kill herself. I dislike him because he’s messy and unpredictable.
“I told you to bring my daughter home.” Harper Black says as he looks up from his desk through the screen. His hair is gray and eyes are dark, almost black.
“I did,” I say, keeping my face neutral.
“Next time I tell you to do something, don’t fucking make me wait.”
“Noted,” I say. I give him the smile I reserve for men like him.
“You’ll get payment in less than an hour. Then Ethan will see you out,” he adds. The screen goes blank, and I’m dismissed. But the message is clear.
I check my client account as I’m walking back to the rear kitchen where I’ve set up an office of sorts. The money I was promised to return V home is in my account.
Now I can leave.
I gather my things. Harper Black’s second, Ethan, follows me into the kitchen to make sure I’m doing what I’m supposed to do. They don’t like me, and I don’t like them. I should stay at least to make sure V is okay, but then when would I ever leave. This is not my fight. It’s V’s.
Her mother was weak, V isn’t. Even if V doesn’t know that yet, being here will show her.
“D, you’re going?” V says as I walk to my car. She’s standing at the staff entrance of her father’s stately home as I place my bag in the trunk. She’s wearing her new jeans and t-shirt, and her hair is snatched back into a ponytail. It’s bright white blonde again. She must have dyed it last night.
She walks over as I get behind the wheel. “I’ll get you your money,” she says.
I shake my head. “You don’t need me V, you never have.”
“Are you coming back?”