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Alone in the bathroom, I stare at myself in the mirror, trying to figure out how in the hell I got here. What I see looking back at me hurts. I’m suddenly Plainy Janey again.
CHAPTER 6
COLE
Janey is snoring upstairs, but other than that, the cabin is utterly quiet and still. Just me and the glow of my laptop as I work.
I should be researching Mr. Webster, but Louisa is on that, and to be frank, she’s better than I am at digitally digging into people’s secrets, especially when we’re talking a deep dive. Still, I have no doubt she’ll find what we need.
The information I’m searching for right now is much easier to track down. It only takes a few quick clicks on social media sites and LinkedIn to get the basics I want to verify and some new insight.
Janey Williams. RN at The Ivy Care Center for the last two years. Graduated with her BSN from the state university before that. Birthdate, July 21st. She’s twenty-five years old. Her best friend is a guy named Mason, who also works at The Ivy and is next on my research list. There are a few pictures of Mason, a brunette woman, Janey, and Henry at a baseball game.
I’m glad to put a face with the name, but Henry’s pretty much exactly what I expected. Namely, unworthy of her. His smug smile as he looks into the camera makes me want to wipe it off his face . . . with my fist.
Back to Janey. All of what I’ve discovered so far aligns exactly with what she’s told me. She’s a what you see is what you get type, a rarity in my line of work and a standard I don’t live up to myself.
She follows pages about curly hair, nursing, codependency, and funny cats. Her shared posts are almost exclusively about shelter animals needing a home or reminders to get an annual physical. She’s a member of several private book chat groups, which I join under an alias, and they seem to be a way for her to track books she’d like to read. There’s an unexpected number of vampire series on that list, which is interesting. Maybe talking isn’t the only thing she likes to do with that mouth of hers.
Surprisingly, her online presence is pretty clean. There are no fake profiles I can find, no dating site accounts, and no polarizing posts anywhere.
I think Janey Williams is exactly who she says she is and who I thought she is after only a few days with her. An always-talking, sunshine-spreading, unexpected beauty who believes the best about everything and everyone, except herself.
Which makes what I’m about to do that much easier.
I admittedly have a bit of a savior complex. I’ve saved more clients than I can count, from their spouses, from work coups, even from themselves. But I keep my professional life and personal life strictly separate. It’s a rule I live by, and that has served me well over the years.
Except I’m breaking the rule. For her. Because Janey Williams should have someone put her first for once in her life. And it’s going to be me.
Not to be arrogant, but there’s no one better suited than me.
I put my laptop away and begin pulling supplies out of the fridge. The last few mornings, she’s had yogurt with a sprinkling of Fruity Pebbles for breakfast. Today, that changes.
I don’t know if it’s the sizzling bacon or steaming hot coffee that does the trick, but a few minutes later, Janey is climbing down the ladder. And watching her come down, her ass swaying side to side as she searches for the next rung, is all sorts of good reasons to make breakfast for her in the morning.
“G’morning,” she mumbles, still yawning and stretching.
Her hair is a rat’s nest of frizzed curls, there are dark smudges beneath her eyes and a trace of drool beside her lips, her socks are slouched down to different levels on her shapely calves, and her oversized T-shirt is crooked on her shoulders. She looks like she slept like the dead but didn’t get any real rest.
“Breakfast’s ready,” I tell her in what passes for a chipper, happy tone for me as I set a plate of bacon, eggs, and toast on the island.
“Oh!” She immediately attacks the coffee as she sits. “I need this. Thank you.”
I sit next to her with a plate of my own but don’t take a bite. Not yet.
After she eats a few mouthfuls and moans her appreciation, I start. “I can’t fix what’s happened, but I can help with one thing.”
Janey pauses with her fork midway to her mouth, and the eggs fall back to the plate. “What?” A weak smile lifts her lips. “Are you gonna spy on Henry?”
She makes it sound like I’m going to hunt him down and rip his dick off. And while the idea was a tempting consideration, I decided not to. That I know all about his work, where he lives, his car make, model, and license plate, his bank accounts, and even what gym he’s a member of are just . . . factoids, little pieces of information that might be useful later, but Janey doesn’t need to know about. Yet.
