The Dirty Series 2(79)

My apartment is just as I left it, silent and neat. Sarah still isn’t back—her business trip was extended—and at first I can’t tell what’s off about the space.

Then it hits me.

Jett.

I haven’t spent an evening without him since all of this started.

The lump that rises to my throat is so painful that for a minute I think I’m choking. I swallow past it, flipping on the lamp in my living room, but when I sit down on the sofa by myself, my body aches for him so badly that I can’t hold it in anymore.

It’s pathetic, sobbing alone in my apartment, so loud and fierce that I’m sure any neighbors who are still awake at this hour will hear and wonder if someone is hurting a dog or killing a seagull.

I cry until my stomach hurts, until there are no more tears left to shed, and then I get up and go into the bathroom. Turn the shower on hot so the steam fills up the room, and then I step inside pulling the curtain closed.

The water cascades down over my skin, washing off the nervousness and fear. I wash and rinse my hair meticulously, then scrub every inch of skin until it’s pink and clean and I’m confident there is nothing from the police station left on me.

When I step out, I reach for the fluffy robe that Jett kept for me next to the shower in his master bathroom, but my hand finds empty air. I settle for a thin towel. I should get around to replacing those sooner rather than later.

I take a look in the mirror.

I still look mostly the same, just with red eyes and skin flushed from the heat of the water. I could use a trim. I could use some sleep.

But there was one thing the shower couldn’t wash off.

The heartbreak.





Chapter Thirty-Eight





Jett



I’ve never been more desperate to put something behind me than I am right now.

I thought Emerald was a disaster, the way she distracted me just long enough to get what she wanted, the way she played me like a fucking fiddle, the way she almost yanked me off course.

Now I know better than that.

Every time I think of Angelica, my face goes hot, my gut churns, my heart feels like someone has stabbed it with a blade.

Why didn’t I learn my lesson? How fucking stupid am I?

Angelica was the disaster. Angelica played me better than Emerald ever could have.

I toss and turn in my empty bed, thinking of Angelica at the police station. They call to update me when she’s released for the night. Not a flight risk, they say. Extortion, they say. It’s all part of some plan to reel in the guy at the center of the crime ring. She’s agreed to turn herself in if charges are filed.

I start to say that they should press charges against her right this very fucking second, but bite back the words.

She affects me even now, in the black depths of my anger.

The way she approached me so tentatively, never wanting to pry but wanting to know...the way she made me want to curb my temper....

It pisses me off.

It pisses me off that someone who lied to me so well and for so long could still have a hold over me.

I force myself out of bed and stomp over to the walk-in closet, choosing the first workout clothes I find. Then I stalk out of the penthouse, stalk into the elevator, stalk across the street to the gym—which is always accessible by key card to VIP clients like myself—and lose myself in hours of sweating, pressing weights up and up, heavier and heavier, and running on the treadmill.

When I’m done, my muscles ache and burn.

But my heart is still an open would.



I manage to claw three hours of sleep out of the early morning. Then, even though it’s Saturday, I go to the office.

I don’t want to be in the fucking penthouse.

I should sell the damn thing and never go back.

I tear through paperwork, reading every single God damn word. By the time Monday morning arrives, I’m going to be so far ahead that Emily’s not going to know what to do. But I’ll tell her. She can schedule meetings into infinity because I’m going to be involved now.

This is going to be my life.

The thought makes my stomach tighten. This office, these people, making money hand over fist, that’s going to be my life.

It was the right choice to end things with Angelica. How was I going to sleep at night knowing there was a liar lying next to me in my bed? A scam artist who just wanted me for my money? A thief who apparently had no qualms about sleeping with the man she was helping to rob?

She didn’t get anything out of this.

The thought bubbles up and my hand clenches around my pen, ruining the signature on the form I’m signing.

“Fuck.”

There’s nobody in the office to hear me.

When the papers are gone, it’s two o’clock in the afternoon and the silence of the building rings in my ears.

My phone has been buzzing throughout the day, but none of the messages are from Angelica.