“You were having just as much fun having a pillow fight as me,” Hale returned.
“Wow. Pillow fight? Here I was hard at work,” I teased, taking another drink.
“How was practice?” Fiona asked, taking the cup.
“Our team got a new forward today. He and Dimitri got into some argument in Russian and Dimitri shoved him into a wall.” What in the world could Ivanov have lost for Dimitri to react like that?
He hadn’t wanted to talk about it when we were shopping. But I knew Dimitri was a little sad about his sister moving into the academy dorms and his brother going back to his high school in Portland.
Still, something else had been bothering him for some time. Maybe it was whatever he couldn’t find?
“Wow. Yeah, someone started a war with Russia,” she laughed.
I didn’t really get the reference.
“Do you want to take a shower?” Hale suggested. “Then I can make some hot chocolate, and we can snuggle on the couch, and watch a movie.”
“Or, we can take a shower, have some hot chocolate, and then we can go shopping at the store you were talking about,” Fiona replied.
“We can do that,” Hale agreed as Fiona got up and went to the bathroom.
I sat there still having to piss, not sure she was starting the shower or not.
“Are you all right? I mean you feel all right, but I just want tomake sure,” Hale said softly.
I leaned into him. “I’d like to be the filling sometime, too.”
“You can absolutely be the filling,” he whispered, his lips seizing mine as my arms wrapped around him.
How could I have never seen it before, that not only was he attracted to me, but we were perfect together romantically.
But I’m glad I figured it out.
Chapter Forty-Eight
Hale
“Are you sure that’s okay?” Grace asked me. “We haven’t found a use for it yet, but I think we should get it off the market before there are repercussions. While your drug isn’t illegal yet, some people are using it for unsavory things.”
“All I hear isI want to buy your drug.Please buy it,” I replied. Otherwise, I’d send out some feeler texts to see if Clegg or someone else wanted to buy it.
“I promise that if the chemists find a use for it, I’ll pay you more,” she added.
“It’s fine.” Because she brought up a good point. I’d carefully formulated the drug so it wasn’t actually illegal. But it wasn’t legal either. Which was how my university could ban me for selling it, but I hadn’t gotten in actual trouble.
However, it was only a matter of time before one or both of those things were no longer true.
Not to mention, I felt awful that some people combined it with Easy-E to do bad things. Who would even do that? No one I personally sold to, I hoped.
“I’ll send over the paperwork,” she replied. “The chemists areexcited to play with it, because the concept is pretty brilliant.”
“I’m pretty proud of it. I found a problem and solved it.” But it was time to move on.
“Will that get you some breathing room? I’m still waiting on the decision about your research grant. Your proposal looks great,” she added.
Grace had been helping me with it so I could send it to my mentor’s professor friend. I was meeting with him in a few days to see if he could supervise my research locally.
“Thanks. Yeah, it will help, and thanks for paying my rent.” I was good for the month, which was helpful since I hadn't worked in almost two weeks.
