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Since she wore clothes, I didn’t think twice before tapping her shoulder to grab her attention.
She jumped a little, staggering from the bushes, and plucked her earbuds out of her ears. “Jesus, Zach. You scared me.”
Right back at you. I am fucking terrified of you, Octi.
Instead of saying this, I knotted my fingers behind my back and pinned her with a dissatisfied glare. “May I ask you a question?”
“No.”
“I’ll ask one anyway. Why am I getting the silent treatment?”
“What silent treatment?” She dumped a pile of roses into a bucket, wiping her hands over her apron. “You have used every opportunity to tell me I’m the help. Why would I seek you out and strike up a conversation?”
She was downplaying what we were, and it pissed me off. I had to take a deep breath and count to ten backwards.
I never got angry.
What the hell was happening?
“You and I struck a deal,” I drawled, towering over her, using every ounce of my self-control not to lash out at her. I’d always pitied my colleagues and friends who succumbed to emotions at the most trivial inconvenience. “And right now, you are not fulfilling your part of the bargain.”
“And you are?” She turned back to the bushes, grabbing the shears from the muddy ground and attacking the roses in full force. This wasn’t cutting. This was decapitating. “I began fulfilling my end of the bargain, yet here I am, three weeks in, and I have no lawyer, no private investigator, and no lead to start fighting Vera with.”
So,thiswas why she was angry and ignoring me? Because shethought I’d forgotten about my promise to her?
My jaw tensed. I had to massage it to stop myself from barking at her. “Arrangements have been made.”
They were not, in fact, made.
I’d planned to prolong the inevitable as much as I could.
“Uh-huh. Sure. Super secret arrangements that nobody’s ever heard about.” More rose-cutting. She was relentless. At this rate, she’d leave my garden completely bare. She had no idea what she was doing. “How very convenient that you kept it all under wraps.”
“I’m working on it.” My lips barely moved when I spoke.
Behind us, the balcony doors clicked open. Mom and Celeste Ayi, no doubt. We had lunch together every Friday.
Only, this Friday, I’d forgotten on account of the fact that I’d just discovered pussy and wanted my next meal.
“I don’t believ?—”
I grabbed Farrow by the arms, past caring what Mom and Ayi might think, and turned her to face me. “I’m afraid you are going to have to believe me. You have no choice. We’ve entered a business agreement. That makes us partners right now. When I said I made arrangements, I meant it. We have a meeting with my team of lawyers and a private investigator today at four. I was waiting for the stock market to close before the meeting.”
She blinked fast, her face jumping from emotion to emotion, starting with confusion and ending with hope.
And then she did something completely terrible.
She smiled.
She smiled, and I felt it everywhere in my body.
“You did that?”
“Yes,” I grumbled. “I told you I would. You should probably change into your normal clothes for the meeting.”
I did a quick once-over, angry that she’d made me explain myself. I’d never been in this situation before.
She nodded, fingering the velvety petals of a rose in her bucket. “I will.”
