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He laughs at that, and damn him, I hate that he knows the truth.
That I haven’t been happy in a really long damn time.
“Just give them a chance. Trust Jenny. She knows her shit, and you know she does or you wouldn’t have hired her.” He shoves my shoulder. “And quit being such a grumpy bastard. That’smyjob.”
I can’t help laughing as I shove him back. “Nope. You’re disgustingly happy now. All sunshine and rainbows.”
“Fuck off,” he says, and we leave my room and move into the living room, where Oscar wastes no time jumping on Axel’s lap and making himself comfortable.
“Can’t believe Cooper got to you too.”
I scratch my dog’s floppy little ears and shrug. “Well, Oscar needed a home, and I have a house. It made sense when Cooper explained it to me.”
Axel laughs, not at all surprised. Cooper became a fast friend of ours a couple of years ago when the racers volunteered at the local animal shelter where he works. The guy is too charismatic and has managed to talk most of us into adopting a pet or two or three.
Except Maverick.
Talk about a grumpy bastard.
Don’t think Cooper will ever wear him down.
“He thinks Oscar needs a playmate,” I say absently, still petting the dog’s ears.
Axel chuckles. “Yup. Sounds like Oscar’ll have a new friend by the end of the month.”
You’d think it would bother Cooper for us to adopt pets when we aren’t at home very often. We travel a lot for our jobs, but Cooper has no problem checking in on the animals. And when he can’t, our neighbors’ kids do it for him.
I swear, he has a little animal-caretakers phone tree going and knows all our schedules. Cooper is something else, I gotta say.
“So you going to give them a chance?”
I sigh and drop my hand. “Axel...”
“Look, I know you’re playing your role, and it’s worked for you. But you need the change. Trust me on this.”
I think back to how angry he was when we first met. How I felt his rage and understood it. Foster kids. Abandoned. No one wanted us.
I remember being angry.
And I remember deciding I’d show them all.
But if my career ends early because I have no fans anymore, that’s really not showing them, is it?
I grab my phone from the table and send a text to Jenny to set up a time with Soren.
She replies almost instantly that she already did, and I’m too damn tired to be annoyed.
“I’ll do it, but he isn’t going to find anything softer about me, Axel. You know me better than anyone.”
“And I like you,” he says.
I swallow hard, hating that. Hating that I know he does, but even he doesn’t know it all. He doesn’t know much, except that I was a foster kid like him.
Because I didn’t want him to know.
And now, I’m just supposed to tell the world?
Not. Happening.
