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I kept my cool, nodded. Someone had a sudden strong interest in me, someone with high connections. Someone who wanted to know what sort of man I was. And if the purpose of it even slightly involved Mila, I was, indeed, doinggreat.
“You should go now,” the chief said, adjusting his wristwatch. “Same time here next week.”
I bowed like a servant to mess with him, then I rose. But just before I was about to walk away, he grabbed me by my arm. Confused, I looked down at the man I had worked with for so many years. A man I trusted with my life, a man who was almost like a father to me.
“Be careful,” he said, his gray eyes serious.
I nodded, then grinned. “You’re getting sentimental with age.”
“Don’t get sassy with me,” he said and pulled out a strange-looking hairbrush. He placed it in my hand and waved at the waitress.
“What the hell is this?” I asked, analyzing the brush.
“Are you kidding? Have you looked at your damn shirt? It’s called a lint roller. Take advice from a man whose wife is obsessed with cats and who hasn’t had a coffee without cat fur in it for years. This is going to be your best friend. Believe me.”
God, I really had lost my edge. Looking at my shirt, I realized that I looked like a crazy cat man. How had this happened? I was always on top of my looks. I kept my suits and uniforms immaculate.
I knew who was to blame for all of this. She was.
Tightening my grip around that lint roller, I started walking toward the door.
“And get some sleep,” I heard the chief yell after me. “You look like shit.”
Stepping out into the warm summer breeze, I almost hated her for a moment. My chief was right. I looked like shit. Not because of the cat hair or my three-day beard, but because of what she was doing to me. She was driving me crazy. I hadn’t slept well in days. For a cop, lack of sleep was nothing unusual. But this was a different sort of tired. I felt emotionally drained, robbed of my will to think and act freely. It was like witchcraft. Like a black magic spell. Or, to be more precise, like someone you like didn’t give two cents and ignored your texts.
Maybe her silence is a good thing.
My glass-half-full attitude briefly fought its way back to the surface. Nobody ever said that we needed to be besties for me to get info on her brother. We could just be coworkers that got along well. People share personal information about their lives at work all the time. There was a high probability she’d give me something on her brother as long as she didn’t know who I really was. Which in itself was disappointing. I had never felt bad about an undercover investigation before. But the more time I’d spent looking at her picture, and the more times I jerked off to the image of her riding me, the more I felt like a piece of shit. I was lying to her. Lying about who I was. And I was coming after her brother, the only family she had left, assassin or not.
Yes, her rejection was a blessing in disguise. Nothing bad or forbidden had happened between the two of us so far. This investigation was still on track to be clean.
Taking a deep breath, I opened the door to my truck. I was already halfway in when my phone vibrated. At first, I thought it was the chief on my undercover phone, but then I remembered that I had put my work phone into my right pocket—this was vibrating in my left.
A surge of excitement rushed through my veins as I practically ripped my cell out of my pocket. I hadn’t saved her name into my contacts yet, but I knew the number by heart.
Mila!
I hammered my finger onto the text icon to read her message.
Hey handsome. How are the tomatoes doing???
Handsome.I grinned. Thinking of something smart to text back, I was interrupted by another text. It was a picture of a tomato plant.
Just walked by this, and it made me think of you.
I loved it. Freaking loved it! When was the last time a woman was interested in something I was passionate about? Usually, they only cared about my looks or the good fuck I gave them. Granted, I knew that this was the sort of woman I’d get for relying on booty calls, but still.
I must have looked like a teenage boy texting her back, smiling like an idiot, but I couldn’t help it; I was just so happy.
The state of my tomatoes lies in the tiny hands of the merciless squirrels.
The usual dots appeared, indicating she was typing.
Hahahaha, she texted back.
Yes! I made her laugh! I pictured that beautiful smile on her face and the way her eyes sparkled when she laughed.
More dots danced on the screen.
