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Pizza sounds perfect, but . . . “Hunt? Pretty sure I’m the easiest person in the world to find. I go home, go to work, rinse, and repeat,” I say, tilting my head left, then right, and then do the same thing again. “I am so ridiculously boring.”
“You are the furthest thing from boring, Miss Walker,” he says, squeezing me around the middle and shaking me a little bit, which makes me laugh. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
The request startles me but delights me too. He doesn’t coddle me, doesn’t want my intelligence to be invisible. To the contrary, he wants me to feed my brain, my soul, and enjoys that same journey with me.
“Did you know the word ‘coroner’ shares a Latin root with the word ‘crown?’ Because the coroner worked for the crown in most cases in Europe.”
“Fascinating.”
If anyone else told me that after sharing a useless trivia factoid, I’d assume they were being sarcastic or polite. Blake actually means it.
He is fascinated by me, and I’m fascinated by him.
“Tell me something too.”
Blake tilts his head and grins. “How about I tell you over pizza because I had a pretty interesting day myself?”
“Ooh, can’t wait to hear about the exciting happenings in the life insurance world,” I tease.
“Ha-ha,” Blake bites back. “I’ll have you know my informative day was spent at the dog park with Sebastian. And then . . .” He lowers his voice, looking over each shoulder even though we’re totally alone, not even a DB in here right now, “I followed him to Yvette’s. He called her his ‘Sugar Momma’.”
I freeze, sliding more and more puzzle pieces into place. They might not be pieces of paper, but they are parts of this mystery all the same.
And then Blake’s last words process.
“Sugar Momma?” I echo.
Blake’s eyes widen with unshed laughter, and I can feel mine do the same, and then we’re both laughing so hard I have tears streaming down my face.
“Those are his words! Along with cougar. And I had to play along with a straight face! You have no idea how hard that was!”
“Rawr,” I growl, putting up a clawed hand.
“Not that kind of cougar, Miss Walker,” Blake jokes with an awful game-show host wink that makes me laugh even harder. “Though I might put those nails to good use . . . after pizza. Let’s go.” My laughter dries up when he catches my hand to press a kiss to the back while giving me a dark look that promises dirty, sexy things that’ll make me forget all about the disappointment of today.
My laughter is the only thing dry, though.
The rest of me?
Hot and wet.
And I don’t mean the sheen of sweat on my forehead. Nope, lower than that, definitely way lower.
Chapter 20
Blake
“She did what?” I blurt, sitting up straight in my chair so fast that the leather creaks beneath me.
Frederick is on the other end of the line, sighing in exasperation. “Check your email. I just sent over the paperwork. I knew this claim would be a pain in my ass. Figured it’d come to this sooner or later. Though I didn’t expect it this soon.”
“No shit,” I reply, not caring to watch my language or stay professional with the big boss. Not when I’ve been named in a lawsuit against Everlife.
Yvette Horne actually did it. Since Sheriff Barnes closed the case on Richard’s death, deeming it due to natural causes, a.k.a. a heart attack over his morning breakfast, Yvette’s beyond ready to get her grubby little hands on the claim payout.
And apparently, she’s done waiting.
I wonder if Barnes’s agreeing to look into the case again, however unofficially, has anything to do with the fire she’s lighting?
“Does she even realize that our standard process is three months? And that’s when cause of death is cut and dry. Something Richard’s most definitely wasn’t.”
“I told the lawyer that, but he kept saying, and I quote, ‘my client is entitled to these benefits, and Everlife is needlessly prolonging the process in an attempt to avoid payout.’ I swear it was like he was reading from a cue card or a teleprompter or something. Maybe he’s new?” He pauses, humming thoughtfully, “Or flipping it around, trying to make it seem like he is so we underestimate him?”
Frederick is twisted enough that he sometimes sees it in others well before anyone else clues in to it. Playing things smart and slick is how he got to the table of big dogs at the corporate office, so I respect his expertise.
“I don’t know,” I tell Frederick as I scan the court filings he emailed me that name Holland Monroe as Yvette’s attorney. “He’s local, but I’ve never heard of him. Want me to ask around?”
“No, we’ve got our legal team on it.” The threat is clear that Frederick expects our corporate team to outgun some local schmuck attorney easily. “Just be ready to testify next week.”
