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Reed would never bitch or moan about these things—I’d only seen or heard them in passing—but it was proof you couldn’t always assume things were all perfectly peachy in a world like his. The higher they are, the further they have to fall.
“I’ve been working for Mr. Lawson for about four years,” Karl finally answered, glancing back in the rearview mirror and meeting my eye. “Why?”
“You ever work for the FBI?”
He snorted loudly. “Nope. No FBI.”
“CIA?
“Who do y—”
“You a Russian spy?” I teased with a smile.
Karl laughed, the deep, hearty rumble filling the vehicle. “I was in the Navy and did some time in the Marines.”
“Some time?”
“Only like six years.”
Rolling my eyes, I sat back in my seat. “Oh yeah, try to downplay a casual stint in one of the hardest occupations and environments in history,” I joked before adding with a heavy sigh, “Though that makes a lot of sense.”
He didn’t offer anything else.
He never really did, though. Just this knowing smile, which could be seriously irritating at times.
Then I got a flash of an idea. “Have you got a girlfriend?”
“I do not,” he replied with a heavy sigh, though I couldn’t tell if it was because of maybe a bad breakup or because I was driving him somewhat crazy with my questions.
“A boyfriend?”
He chuckled. “No. I married my high school sweetheart, but she struggled with me being deployed all the time, so we divorced after a couple of years.”
My heart felt the pain in his voice. “That must have been really hard.”
He cleared his throat, and I pretended as if I didn’t notice the way his hands had gripped the steering wheel tighter. “It was. But I wanted her to be happy, not sitting around at home, jumping every time the phone rang. So we agreed it was best we both moved on. That was almost fifteen years ago.”
I quickly did the math in my head.
Karl was probably closing in on forty, but he sure as hell still looked like he could take on anyone half his age and kick their ass.
“Why all the questions?” he asked, glancing at me in the rearview mirror.
“I have this friend, Abby…” His laughter was loud but also kind of nice to hear, given how serious Karl could be. “Seriously, she’s a personal trainer. She’s strong. Smart. Funny! I think she’d give you a run for your money.”
I sat up a little so I could see more than just his eyes in the mirror. There was a smile! A genuine smile. I’d take it.
“I won’t say anything else, but the idea is there if you’re looking for a fun date.”
“I’ll let you know.” It wasn’t a yes, but it wasn’t a no, and I was going to consider that a win. It wasn’t often I got to actually set my friends up with men who I knew for sure were one of the good ones. And Karl was a good one.
“Reed’s got a late meeting this afternoon,” Karl explained as we pulled past Reed’s uptown office. “So I’m just going to take you home.”
I think I’d become a little too accustomed over the last month to having someone drive me around instead of having to catch buses, trains, or taxis. It meant I got to appreciate the city a lot more and see things and places I didn’t usually get the time to admire, even though I’d lived in Massachusetts for the majority of my life.
“That’s fine. I think I’ll have a long shower and read for a while,” I told him as I stared out the window, watching the buildings pass by. Thinking about curling up in my pajamas for a couple of hours and losing myself in a book already had my shoulders dropping and my body sinking into the seat.
Since the talk I’d had with Reed the other day about reading and what I wanted to do with my future, I’d thought a lot about what kind of options I had and which jobs were on my dream list.
