Chapter Fourteen
Between the travel and the weekend at his mother’s house, by the time Monday rolled around Jamie needed a break. He knew, with the Shinobi deal that a break was nowhere in sight. He really needed to work on his time management.
Cora had stayed at his place last night. When they’d gotten back from his mother’s, they’d both been exhausted. After ordering a pizza, they’d gone to bed early. Neither of them had gotten more than an hour or two of sleep the night before.
“C’mon, Cora,” Jamie complained. “Hurry up. I don’t wanna hit traffic!”
He rolled his eyes when he heard her muffled reply from the bathroom, “Keep your pants on, Jamie. I’m almost ready!”
A moment later, Cora stepped out of the bathroom, grabbed her heels, purse, and briefcase.
“Ready,” she said.
They were a little bit late as they did end up hitting traffic, but they still made it to the office a few minutes after nine. As they walked up the hallway toward her office, he got ready to bid her good-bye, then felt her stiffen against his side.
A familiar-looking man stood in front of her office, pacing. It took Jamie a minute to place him. Bryce Wallace. Jamie fought his instinctive urge to punch the man in his face and asked her, “Do you need a minute or do you want me to come with you, baby?”
Cora tightened her hold his arm and walked toward her office door.
“What, Bryce?”
“Good to see you too, Cora,” he said, quietly. “Celia made me wait in the hallway.”
Cora struggled to keep an even tone when she said, “Bryce. This is Jamie Connolly. Jamie, this is Bryce Wallace.”
Bryce sized him up for a moment before he stuck a hand out to greet him. Jamie shook his hand and murmured the appropriate greeting even as he pictured his fist plowing into Bryce’s smug face.
“Anyway. I know you don’t want to see me, but...I wanted to stop by and give you this.” Bryce held a paper out to her. “I pushed your restraining order through. We’re trying to serve him with it, but we can’t locate him. He s
kipped out on his P.O. and isn’t staying at his last known address anymore. I saw the paperwork come through and called in a few favors.”
He had the grace to look more than a little embarrassed when he added, “It’s the least that I can do, considering how things ended.”
Cora blinked at him and said, “Thank you for this. Really.”
“You’re welcome. Take care,” he said, and after giving Jamie a nod, he walked toward the elevator.
“Well that wasn’t awkward, right?” Cora asked.
Jamie smiled and said, “Course not. You okay?”
“Yep. And I got my restraining order.”
“Good,” he said, feeling a swamping sense of relief as he dropped a kiss on the top of her head. “I’m probably going to work straight through lunch. See you tonight?”
“I’ll stop by when I’m ready to go,” Cora promised. “Have a good day.”
“You too,” he said, as he turned to walk down the hallway.
Jamie managed to work through the majority of remaining smaller jobs that he’d booked by five, so he was able to shift gears and focus specifically on the Shinobi campaign. He was also able to work out a doable time line that wouldn’t kill him.
He had even managed to make some progress on tomorrow’s to-do list by the time Cora showed up. She poked her head into his office and said, “Hey you.”
He glanced up at her and said, “Hey. Good day?”
She nodded, then studied him and asked, “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah,” he said. He rubbed a hand over his eyes and added, “Long day. Let me just save up and we can get out of here. I’m beat.”