“Sure, take off as many days as you need,” I said around a mouthful of food.
Hobbs refilled my coffee and sat the creamer beside my cup. “Thank you. Two days will be plenty. I’m afraid you’ll starve before I come back.”
“I’ll eat out,” I said, dumping the cream into my coffee. I looked at the bottle. “Where do I get this?”
“I stocked the fridge. You will have plenty until I return.”
“You’re the best, Hobbs.”
I finished off the rest of my food. I felt better already. Bacon has a way of putting a man in a better mood.
I was ready to get down to business. The fact was, I could’ve had this done by now. Dumb accidents and coincidences kept ruining things, but I couldn’t let that go on. Finding out your boss is the King of Death himself, well, that has a way of lighting a fire under a guy. That and the knowledge I would be recalled if I didn’t complete my job. None of this was really what I wanted, but like a lot of my life, these were the cards I’d been dealt. All I could do was play my hand.
It was time to amp things up. To get the job done. The Target wouldn’t even know what hit her. Grim would be satisfied and Charming would be off my back and out of my house.
“Put my coffee in a travel mug, Hobbs. I have somewhere I need to be.” I got up from the island and went to grab my coat and keys.
“Do you have an appointment, sir?”
“As a matter of fact, I do,” I zipped up my coat and pulled a black knit cap over my head. “I’ll be gone all day. Go ahead and get a head start on your vacation.”
Hobbs handed me my mug and I thought I saw some worry pass behind his eyes.
“Sir, you remember that talk we had not so long ago?”
“The one about my job?”
“Yes, that’s the one.”
“What about it?”
“I hope you have given what I said some thought.”
I actually had. Quite a lot. But the fact of my situation was that I really didn’t have the luxury of choice. Well, I guess I did. I could choose to be sent to a lonely, empty existence—an existence that promised to be worse than hell itself. Or, I could suck it up, do my job, and preserve my humanity, my life.
I pushed away the voice that whispered my life would come at the cost of someone else’s.
“I did, Hobbs,” I told him, turning away. He didn’t say anything until I reached the door that led to the garage.
“Remember,” he said quietly but loud enough that my hand froze on the knob, “with great sacrifice sometimes comes reward.”
I stood completely still for long moments as his words kind of wrapped themselves around me. They echoed through my ears with some kind of meaning I didn’t understand. Then I blinked and the feeling was gone.
“Thanks for the advice,” I called and left the townhouse, backing my little Roadster out onto the street.
I pushed away the feeling that I somehow left a very disappointed butler behind.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Bully - A person who is habitually cruel or overbearing, especially to smaller or weaker people.”
Piper
As if getting up early on a freezing cold morning, riding a bus that makes you feel like a traitor, and worrying the whole ride about your best friend’s life wasn’t enough, I get to work and find out I’m stuck with Emilio.
Yay.
Emilio is a new addition to the diner’s staff (any other time I might’ve said family, but I would rather get poked repeatedly with a sharp object than call that guy family), and he has to be the hardest person to get along with I’ve ever met.
