“I wanted to thank your mom for letting me gatecrash her birthday dinner.”
“I invited you. You don’t pay.”
“Okay. Thank you, Splice.”
His head snapped down, and he stared at her hotly, and Lisa felt the earth shift under her heels. Oh wow, his effect was still very much there.
“You call me Ryan.”
Okay, then. Wordlessly, she nodded and pulled her purse over her shoulder.
“I should get going after I tell your mom goodnight.”
A phone appeared in front of her, and she blinked at Ryan. “Put your number in.”
She blinked again. “What for?”
He half-smirked. “Your number, Lisa.”
She just went along with it, put her info in his phone, then gave it back and watched him shove it into his back pocket.
Pretty soon, Lisa came into the house, took off her heels, and put on her fuzzy slippers.
As she got ready for bed, she thought about the night, still wondering why she’d agreed to have dinner with them. But his mom was lovely, and it didn’t hurt looking at Ryan again.
Ryan: Did you get home safely?
Her heart clattered with a rush of nerves as she looked at the phone screen while she dotted night cream on her face. It took her a minute to decide whether to reply at all.
Lisa: Yes. Thank you for dinner. Goodnight.
It was to the point and didn’t invite a conversation. But not even thirty seconds later, a new message came through.
Ryan: Talk soon
Talk soon?
What did that even mean?
Was he intending to text her again? To see her again?
Impossible.
Since she’d hidden an enormous lie from him for so long and worried it might be revealed, she knew it wasn’t a good idea to get back into his life, even if she wanted to.
She stared at her screen, reading his two messages, then deleted them.
ELEVEN
Splice
“Have you had any issues with Bryce since you paid him a visit?” Asked Axel.
The Prez was resting against the clubhouse bar, Splice at his side. It was early the next morning, and few people were there.
“Nah, he paid up, but it’s his last warning. If I have to deal with him again, I say we find someone else to manage his dispensary.”
“I talked to Devil, and he agrees with you. Of the ten dispensaries we invested in, Bryce’s has the lowest turnover. Give it four weeks and see where we’re at then.”
