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He smirked. “Because it amused me to keep you in the dark.”
“Wow.” Shaking my head, I sighed. “You really are a jerk. And here, I thought it might just be a front.”
He sighed sympathetically. “Sadly, no. It’s not.”
“So I really broke into Kaitlynn’s evil stepmother’s home? No freaking way.”
“Not your finest hour, certainly.”
“Well, that sucks.” I wondered if I should confess my B & E transgressions to Kaitlynn. She’d forgive me, no doubt, sweet thing like her. But I kind of didn’t want her knowing how not-saintly I was. Then again, I didn’t want to lie to her, either. She didn’t deserve that.
Well, hell. This was a conundrum.
When I turned to reenter the diner, my thoughts all awhirl, my alley companion caught my arm gently and lifted his eyebrows. “Where do you think you’re going?”
Shooting him a glare, I pulled my arm free, which he let me do more easily than I thought he would. “I’m going back to work,” I said. “I don’t get off the clock for another hour.”
“Fine,” he allowed with a single nod, as if he felt he actually had the right to tell me what I could and couldn’t do. “But then you’re coming to dinner with me. To Lana’s.”
“Like hell,” I started.
Kaitlynn hadn’t said a single good thing about her stepmother. And if Kaitlynn couldn’t even like her, then I certainly didn’t want anything to do with her. That was for damn sure.
But the man in front of me shook his head. “She said you were to be there or she was going to contact your boss—whoever that is at Trudy’s—and she was going to get you fired.”
“What?!” I exploded. “She can’t do that.”
He looked slightly regretful when he answered, “You’d be surprised the things she can do and has done. This wouldn’t even make the top hundred.”
“But I don’t want to eat with her.”
“And I don’t want to be genetically connected to her,” he bit out, his eyes narrowing, “but here we are.”
“But…” Why would that woman want to eat with me? None of this made sense. “It sounds too hinky. You must know she just wants something from us.”
“She definitely wants something from us,” he said dryly. “She doesn’t invite people to dine with her out of the goodness of her heart or because she enjoys their company. There is a selfish, evil reason behind everything she does, and we’re going over there tonight to find out what that reason is because it’s far safer to gather all the cards you can when going up against a woman such as Lana Judge than to remain ignorantly in the dark.”
My stomach sank as I wondered, “Oh God. Do you think she knows I stole those things?”
He lifted one eyebrow. “I guess we’ll know at eight. When she expects us for dinner.”
“Shit.” I closed my eyes, feeling my own doom close in around me.
I guess I was going back to the apartment with that pretty, sparkly entrance. I had no idea admiring one stupid door would land me in this kind of mess.
Damn door.
Chapter 13
Gabby
He remained at the café.
Sitting at the end of the counter in his suit and tie as he waited for me to finish my shift, he stuck out like a sore thumb among the crowd of blue-collar workers, kids fresh from school, and homeless junkies popping in for a cup of coffee after they found enough change on the sidewalk outside.
But he paid the others no attention, too busy on his phone, rescheduling an appointment with some guy he called Gutierrez.
“…Because something came up and I can’t make it tonight,” he bit out sternly. “Why do people usua
