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All of that aside, he needed to go home and settle things with Hannibal. Let him know what he had found out about their Jewel. Then he could decide if the risk of disappointment was worth putting himself on the line.
Chapter 10
Friends are like boobs. Some are big, some are small. Some are real and some are fake.
Jade
The long, nighttime drive to Dark Ink Tattoo Studio gave Jade too much time to think. Music filled the car, and she tapped the steering wheel to the rhythm of the beat, trying to burn off some nervous energy. She was a coward and hadn’t called Hannibal to tell him about the appointment she’d set up for today.
When the three of them exchanged contact info and set up plans to meet in a few days, she had assumed they would call or text. But the men had gone radio silent. She’d expected them to at least reach out about coming into Leap to train. She tried not to be too mad. The phone went both ways and she could have reached out even if they hadn’t. Her appointment today with Hannibal would have been the perfect excuse to do so.
Instead, she obsessively checked her phone for messages while at home and at work. Work had kept her relatively busy. Training the women from their Club earlier had been fun. Becoming friends with them if this thing with Hannibal and Ink didn’t go sideways would be easy. They seemed like a tight-knit group of women who wouldn’t want to make things awkward by continuing a friendship after things fell apart.
Now she was driving down the road with her nerves eating at the sides of her stomach. Should she have called Hannibal and let him know she would be at Dark Ink? It wasn’t like she was an unwanted interruption. She had a legitimate appointment, made over a month ago, but a heads up probably would have been respectful. Would Ink be there?
Flashbacks of the scorching events in her office replayed in her mind too often for comfort. Ink’s no orgasm rule was one of the hardest she’d ever had to follow. Sleep the previous night had eluded her and the temptation to call them was intense. The idea of asking for permission to play with herself both excited and embarrassed her. Even worse, every time she sat down and tried to work in the office, her whole body came alive with reminders of their time together.
They’d seemed interested in continuing things and taking them further, but the two days of silence had eaten away at her confidence. She tried to strengthen her spine. She wasn’t a teenager praying for the attention of the cool kids. If they wanted to play it so relaxed, they didn’t bother to call or text, then she would be an adult and tell them that wasn’t acceptable to her.
She’d state clearly that she was not okay with being forgotten. If they couldn’t be bothered to even send a single text after playing her body like an instrument, then she didn’t need their kind of relationship. She would tell them that she wanted the tattoos but possibly anything else was a mistake.
Her phone rang. She looked down at the console on her car dash and groaned. Eric was calling. She didn’t want to have to deal with him when her emotions were already bouncing all over the place. But if she put him off, things would escalate and get worse.
With a deep breath, she hit the hands free ACCEPT button.
“Hi Eric. What do you want?” She was proud of how neutral her voice sounded. He needed to understand that she was done with putting up with his bullshit. He’d damaged the close friendship, and she doubted it would ever recover.
“Hey Jade. I’m sorry I’ve been such an ass.”
Hope, that stupid emotion, fluttered in her at his opening words. They’d been friends for so long that it was hard to match the man he’d been for the last year, with the over a decade friendship they’d had before it.
She missed the Eric who had been her rock through some of the hardest times in her life and wanted him back. Hell, she would have even accepted if he turned back into the fun, carefree party boy he’d become while they’d been on the TV circuit. The surly, angry version of him hurt her heart every single time they talked.
“I’m not sure what to say to that.” His sigh through the phone was loud.
“Yeah, I know. I am sorry. Things are really rough right now.”
“Are you ready to tell me what’s going on?” Her navigation system told her there were fifteen minutes before she would arrive at Dark Ink. Her appointment wasn’t for another thirty minutes. She hit the blinker, moving into the slow lane so they could talk longer.
“Are you in the car? I thought you’d be at the gym.”
Jade rolled her eyes. She did spend most of her time there, but the place closed over two hours ago. If it hadn’t been for the private lesson, she would have been back at her apartment. He should know the gym schedule as well as she did.
“Gym is closed, Eric.”
“Then I’ll come by your apartment so we can talk.”
“No. I’m not there.” Suspicion filled her response.
“Then where are you?”
“What business is that of yours?”
“It’s after eight on a weeknight.”
“What are you, my dad?” Not that her dad had ever cared enough to check up on her.
“Where are you going?”
