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He motioned behind me. “Can you get the door?”
I did, then cursed my own self. I was following him around, doing what he said, and for what? This was my place, damn the technicalities. Still, though, I locked the door before stepping behind the desk and behind where he was standing.
I scooted in and used my hip to push him out.
“What are you doing?”
I huffed, putting some extra oomph into my hip. “Moving you.”
“Why?”
“Because this is my office.”
He was looking down at me, his top lip slightly curled up. “Are you having a late reaction to the robbery? Should I take you to the hospital again, get checked out?”
I paused. “What?”
“You’re acting odd.”
My chest swelled up. “I don’t care what you say about my place. This is my place. Mine. I’ve put the work into it. I’ve renovated it. Upgraded it. I have great staff—”
“I doubt you’ve upgraded everything.”
I flushed, ignoring that insult, if it was an insult.
He shifted so he was facing me squarely. “You paid your father thirty thousand for this bowling alley. Since then, you have turned it around so it is thriving, but you were still conned out of thirty thousand. I’m going to look through your accounts and see where else you made not-smart decisions.” He started to go around me again, reaching for the computer.
“Agh. Stop.” Dickhead.
I reached for his hands and tried to maneuver myself so I was in his way.
He cursed under his breath before he wrapped his arms around me.
I squealed.
Then he was picking me up, and oomph! I was pressed back against his chest. A tingle shot through me. He took three steps back and pivoted, and I was placed back on my feet again. His hands went to my hips, and he urged me in front of him. “The coffee is almost done. Why don’t you grab both of us a cup so you can cool down?”
Heat flamed inside of me. “You did not just treat me like I’m the secretary. Who do you think you are—” And I stopped talking because he was fully trying to hold back a laugh, waiting for my reaction.
And, oh god, his whole face transformed.
I had to stop and blink for a beat before my mind caught up with what was happening.
“You’re trying to piss me off.”
“Well, no, but the last comment, yes.” He sat in my chair, and I’d missed when he turned my computer on, but the screen was asking for my password. He motioned to it. “I want to see your books. Let me in.”
I drew back. “No way. I don’t know what you’re going to do in there.”
“Molly.” His voice was low, almost soothing.
I hated it. Or I hated how I should’ve hated it.
He was the enemy.
“What?”
“My first company was in cybersecurity. Did you know that?”
Oooh. Whoa. No. But also not surprising. “I didn’t know that.”
“Me asking for your password was a sign of courtesy. I’m able to get in with or without you. Let me see your books. Right now it’s under my family’s name, so if the police come in, I need to see what they’re going to see. That could happen. OC knows this place is connected to my family. When that criminal came in here, that gave them an opening to actually coming in here themselves. Are you following me?”
“How do I know you won’t plant evidence or something? Or steal from me again?”
“I’m not the one who stole from you.” His eyes flicked upward. “Just open your computer.”
I did, even though my head was yelling at me not to, but what was I going to do here? He was the mob, for freak’s sakes. You didn’t say no to the mob.
I typed in “IHATEASHTONWALDEN23” and stepped back.
“Really?” He gave me a dry look.
“I might’ve changed it this morning.”
He rolled his eyes, moving in and starting to click through my computer, and he was going fast. I looked at these things like they were trying to speak to me in an alien language, but not him. He was an alien.
I was remembering what he’d just said. “You think the police will come and look through my books?”
He never stopped studying the computer screen. “They could, yes.” He paused, glancing at me. “You had no incoming calls last night, and your only visitors were your two employees. Detective Worthing hasn’t tried to talk to you?”
How did he—never mind. “You have my phone tapped?”
“I have a man on you, and he’s able to track who is calling or texting you, yes. We put your cousin in charge yesterday, but even he didn’t try to contact you. Why not? He was told you’d been held up at gunpoint. He wasn’t concerned?”
“Glen and I aren’t really cousins. We were in the same foster house for a while.”
“I’m aware of this, but if you call him your cousin, that implies there’s some form of kinship there. Why didn’t he call to see how you were?”
