AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Do you need me for something?” she asked, undeterred by my lack of reaction. She rose onto her toes and I couldn't help myself from dipping my head to brush my lips over hers.
Nothing more. It’s not fair to her.
My cock screamed obscenities in its confined space, but I ignored that too and sucked in a sharp breath. “I uh, don’t need you for events or anything else. Anymore.” the shop fell silent. I blew out the breath between my teeth.Those weren’t the words I practiced this morning.“That— it came out wrong.”
Floss dropped her arms to her sides and took a long step back, creating a cold abyss where her body warmth had been. “No. You said that just right. I’m fine with these boxes. Thanks.” She turned her back to me in an obvious dismissal, the lines of her shoulders hard beneath the white stretchy shirt she wore over her jeans.
“Floss— I don’t want to invalidate what we shared the other night.” I stumbled over her name.Just give up now and go. You can’t fix this.
But I wanted to. Badly.
“Yes you just have.” Her words grounded me, brought me back.
I cleared my throat. “Why don’t we start this again? Forget the fake stuff, and concentrate on—”
“Forget the fake stuff?” Her blue eyes flashed the color of a lightning struck sea, and like any doggone sailor, I held my ground. “I’m not sure there’s anything real about you, Acton Cunningham. Why don’t you go back to work and figure out who you’re supposed to be and, in a few years, when you’ve grown the fuck up, you can come back and I’ll see if you’ve made the mark. Not that it will be likely,” she snapped.
I nodded slowly; I’d earned that one. “I’ll leave you and Dolly alone. I’m sorry, Floss. It’s for the best.”
“Thank you for that.” The words came out in the same tone she’d use forget the fuck out.
I backed up a step, trying to communicate the rent in my heart as I found the door with my ass. Swearing softly under my breath, I pulled the glassed door inward and a delivery man with arms stacked full of boxes stamped with the shop's logo fell in.
“Fuck. Sorry, man.” I helped gather the parcels, dusting chalk off my hands along with some of the green spongy stuff cut flowers were always stuck into. “Sorry about the mess.”
The man grumbled something in a language that sure as hell wasn’t Texan, and headed toward the desk. I glanced over his shoulder but Floss had already hidden. My heart thumped dully in a hollow chest as I worked my way across the street, seeing nothing at all as I hit my office doors. In a short period I’d achieved the career upgrade I craved, found the perfect girl, fallen in love and broken her heart.
This was what I planned, what had been the right thing to do. So why did it feel so fucking bitten in my mouth?
Cursing softly and startling an old lady with a fluffy dog on a lead chattering to the reception desk, I hit the stairs, intent on running out my black mood.
How much fucking worse could today get?
CHAPTER EIGHT
Floss
I thanked the dark-haired man before me three times before I realized he was waiting on a signature from me.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, barely glancing at the boxes stacked beside the desk. “There’s no more, is there?”
“No,” he answered in a thickly accented voice. “But I take these.” He pointed to the first stack of deliveries that overpopulated the desk. “Take them back. Not for you.”
“Ahhh,” I started, glancing down at the register. Acton had thrown me totally off kilter and Ella only lasted an hour before she puked all over the office, which was currently airing even though she’d been gone for hours. There was a hole in my heart and my brain had stopped functioning. “I think I might check with the owner before you take anything, okay? I know there was a mix up but I don't want to send back anything she’d expected to be here.”
“No. I take these. You sign.” He thrust a digital pad into my hands.
I grabbed the brick of a device, clutching it tight. “It’ll just take a moment.” I set the brick down beside the register. “I’ll call her.”
“No.”The driver—whom I realized I’d never met before—lunged forward, knocking my phone from my hand. It hit the tiled floor, a death-announcing crack echoing in my ears.
Today might be the worst day of my life.
I loved Acton, had just figured that out, and now he was gone. My phone was broken and the delivery driver was a psycho.
“Okay, that’s enough.” Biting back the urge to scream obscenities at the ceiling, I turned to him in full, my hands on my hips and came nose to barrel with a matte black handgun. Tiny scratches decorated the metal that was so close to my face I could see the depth of them. “Fu—”
“Those. Mine. I take.”
