The Dirty Series 2(80)
Good.
I don’t want to hear anything she has to say.
What could she say that would make her actions any less heinous?
That she loves you, and she loves her brother, and she couldn’t let him get taken out by some creep. That the stakes were too high. That she got in over her head.
No.
Not even that.
She can never take back what she’s done.
I text Stuart and tell him to take the rest of the night off, then walk home, looking in the windows of all the shops and restaurants.
Everywhere I look, there are couples.
Jaw set, muscles tense, I pick up the pace.
No matter how much it hurts right now, I had no other option.
I can never let her—or any woman—get that close to me again.
I spend the evening ensconced in the penthouse, looking it over.
No, I’m not going to sell it. That would be letting her win, and I’m not about to let her achieve that kind of victory over me.
Instead, I’ll remodel the whole damn thing. Remove any traces of her. Replace the furniture. Make it a new place.
Make it mine.
Like she was supposed to be mine.
“No,” I say out loud to the emptiness. “Not a fucking chance.”
Isn’t there?
No.
I strip off my jacket and suit pants and change into comfortable lounge clothes, and then I crank up the air conditioning.
Now that I’ve got the penthouse to myself, I can do whatever the hell I want.
Tomorrow I’ll get back in the game. Tomorrow I’ll ask Connor to go to the Swan. He’ll find us some beautiful women to talk to and I can enjoy them for an hour and leave them behind, just like it’s supposed to be.
Just like it will be, forever.
In the meantime, I can finally enjoy the quiet. The peace.
It’s not deafening. It’s how I like it. I like the solitude.
I relish the solitude.
I do.
But solitude is nothing if you’re just going to sit around and waste it, so I queue up my favorite moves from my digital collection—my own personal Netflix—then place a call to Sasabune.
“It’s Jett Brandon.”
The people at the hostess station put me through to the chef.
“Buddy!” he cries. “Takeout for you and the lady?”
He doesn’t need to know a damn thing. He just needs to send a metric fuck ton of food and send it fast so I can get started on my night in.
“Give me your best,” I say, and sit back and wait.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Angelica
My lawyer calls at ten o’clock on Sunday. I’m already awake, burrowed under my comforter. I don’t know how long I’ve been lying like this.
I don’t care.
“Hello?”
“Good morning, Angelica. Are you at home?”
“Of course.”
“How soon can you be at the police station?”
I shove my hair away from my face and roll over onto my back. “Half an hour. Is there something they want?”
She sighs a little, like I’m deliberately being an idiot. “They want to question you, Angelica.”
“Okay.”
“I’ll meet you there.
When she hangs up, I toss my phone onto the bedside table and get out of bed. My muscles ache like I’m an old woman. I feel vaguely ill.
Heartbreak.
I can’t summon the energy to deal with a full shower, and anyway, I stood in there long enough last night. So I compromise by taking five minutes to twist my hair into a respectable bun at the back of my head and choose an outfit that won’t make me look like some kind of desperate criminal.
If only I hadn’t done this to Jett.
If only Charlie had chosen anyone else to be the target.
Shit, if that were true, then I might still have a chance with the man I’m almost certain is the love of my life.
It was damn stressful, doing what I did, but when I was with him there were stretches of time that it just...faded into the background. He made me feel treasured. Precious. He made me feel wanted. He made me feel like I’d never have to worry about walking past some street harasser, heart racing, again.
“That’s over now,” I tell myself in the mirror when I stop to check my outfit one last time. “It’s over.”
As soon as I step inside the police station, I’m nearly bowled over by a woman who’s coming at me at full speed.
At first I try to step aside—my mind is on Jett—but then her arms envelop me and I inhale her scent, and oh, my God—
“Mom?”
She squeezes me tight. “Angelica.” I look past her shoulder, and Adam is standing there, too, hands in his pockets, bags under his eyes.
My mom hugs me for a long, long minute, and then steps back to look at me. I’m expecting to see disappointment in her eyes, but they’re filled with confusion. “I don’t understand, Angie,” she says after a beat. “They want to ask me questions, too, but I didn’t have anything to do with this. Adam won’t even tell me what’s going on.”