Page 33 of His Puppet

“Put away?” My smile falls.

Matt nods. “I’m a detective.”

I’m deadpan for a few seconds while I try to process that. You havegotto be fucking kidding me.

My chest starts to ache, and I blink, trying to recover.

He doesn’t know my real name.

He doesn’t know who I am.

This is fine.

“Wow, adetective.No wonder you’re so strong.” I gesture to his broad chest, then roam my eyes around the room. “And successful.”

Matt laughs. “You’re flattering me.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I get a modest paycheck.” He chuckles nervously. “If you’re into older men, I’m sure you’ve seen better than this.”

I shrug. “I didn’t say I’d been with one. Just always wanted to, you know?”

“Ah.” Another glance down at my cleavage. Jesus, he’s obvious. “Well, it’s too bad I’m a married man.”

I sigh. “Yeah. Hey, where is your wife, anyway?”

“Work. I’m on the nightshift.”

“Oh,” I say that like it’s somehow impressive. “So you get all the action then, don’t you? That’s when the real bad boys come out.” Bad boys like Blade, I’m guessing.

“It’s the daytime criminals you really have to worry about. The low-level thugs are usually the ones we see at night.”

He must see the slight drop in my enthusiasm because he goes on.

“I usually work days. Every once in a while there’s a big case that needs twenty-four hour surveillance.”

I lean forward and grin with mock excitement. “Ooo sounds intriguing. What’s the case?”

“Classified. If I told you, I’d have to kill you.” He winks, and I giggle.

Okay, I don’t have all day for this shit. Where is the fucking laptop?

I glance around and come up empty, as I knew I would. A beep sounds, and Matt pulls a beeper,yes a beeper, out of his pocket and frowns at whatever he reads.

“Well,” I say, slowly climbing off the stool. “Thank you so much for the water. I’d better let you call animal control.”

“Right.” He nods like he forgot about my made-up dead dog story. If I’m being honest, I did too. “I’ll walk you out.”

I walk ahead of him out of the kitchen while scanning the house. There’s a living room on the left and a staircase that leads to the second floor. No laptop on the coffee table, and no bag in sight.

“Actually,” I say, spinning and putting a hand on Matt’s chest. “Do you mind if I use your restroom before I leave?”

He shakes his head and waves his hand to a hallway on our right that has two doors. I walk down it, and he follows with a hand lightly touching my back. He throws open a door and we walk into a bedroom. “Right through there,” he says, pointing to the obvious bathroom entrance. “The upstairs bath is being renovated,” he explains, I’m assuming so I won’t find it suspicious that he just led me to his bedroom.

He anxiously glances down at his beeper that goes off again. “I need to make a quick call. Can you show yourself out?”

Well that couldn’t have worked out any more perfectly.

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