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“I love taking care of you, princess,” he whispers.
God.Swoon.
The bed dips with his weight, and he curls up behind me, cocooning me in his warm embrace. For the second night in a row, I fall asleep feeling safer than I ever have.
CHAPTERNINE
AXEL
My phone rings right as I’m drying the last dish from breakfast. I can’t cook worth shit, but Gemma is an incredible chef. She somehow made bacon, egg, and cheese breakfast sandwiches with homemade spicy aioli. I said I’d clean up while she got started on editing her latest podcast.
I dry my hands as my phone rings again. “All right, all right, I hear you,” I mutter to myself. Reaching into my pocket, I’m surprised when I see who is calling. “Kingsley?” I ask once I’ve answered.
“Axel,” comes his ever-professional voice. “Are you available for a job?”
I pull the phone away from my ear and check the number again. I haven’t heard from Kingsley Bowman in… five years? Six? He was a client of mine back in the day when I was still working my way up and off the streets. Kingsley went to a prestigious college and hired me to work on his cars from time to time. He loves American muscle cars, which is the only reason I agreed. Well, that, and he paid a ridiculous amount of money for my services, claiming he’d rather have one mechanic he knows well than fifty he doesn’t trust.
Didn’t matter to me why, as long as he kept paying me.
When Kingsley discovered I also had a knack for computers and sleuthing, he hired me for different jobs. Less legit, but a bigger paycheck. The last job I did for him was when he was about to close a billion-dollar real estate deal with a large company that was merging with an even larger company.
I did some digging into the CEOs, CFOs, and other corporate alphabet job titles. Pulled some info on several civil suits against each company for shady practices. I ended up helping Kingsley raise the offer by twenty percent. He ensured it was reflected in my paycheck.
“Hello? Are you still there?”
“Yeah,” I reply, his sharp tone pulling me from my thoughts.
“I need some info on an employee. Well, technically, she’s a contract worker.”
“I’m your guy.”
Kingsley grunts something that sounds like “good,” which is about all the confirmation I’ll get from him. The successful real estate mogul might give Blade a run for his money when it comes to one-word responses and a general grouchy disposition. Then again, the Prez has gotten better since Sonya.
“Her name is Clementine Clarkson.”
Down to business, as per usual. Kingsley Bowman doesn’t have time for chit-chat.
I grab a pad of paper and a pen, jotting down the name as he spells it out for me.“Need a basic profile, or am I looking for something specific?”
“Basic profile to start. Well, maybe… Do you have access to medical records?”
“Uh, is someone sick?” I’m confident in my skills, but hacking into a medical database is a bit much.
“Yes. Maybe. I mean, there’s no other reason for it,” he mutters, more to himself than to me.
“It?”
“She’s so damn…happy,” he says, the disgust evident in his voice.
“And that’s a medical condition?” I hold back my laughter, but only because Kingsley has the money and power to send someone down here to punch me in the face for making fun of him.
“She has no reason to be so cheery. It’s unsettling.”
“Okay…” I grin from ear to ear, loving how uncomfortable he seems with this woman’s happiness.
“So, can you do it?”
“Look, I’ll find out what I can, but I’m not breaking into a medical facility’s mainframe.”
