“What?” I ask, looking around again.
“Here’s your phone.” He hands me my cell, and I’m still a little lightheaded when he starts to walk off again. I watch in a daze as he leaves, but then he turns around to face me from a few yards away. “Sophie?”
“Yeah?”
“Change the picture on your phone,” he demands before he turns and disappears into the crowd.
I stand there for a few seconds wondering what just happened. Eventually, I pull myself together enough to make it to my car. When I get there, I realize that I didn’t even put the top up or take my bag with me because I had been in such a hurry. I turn quickly to look in my backseat, seeing that my bag is still there. I breathe out a sigh of relief, start my car, and head home.
I live in a small, two-bedroom house just outside of Nashville. I bought it cash with the money I got from my mom’s life insurance policy after she passed away. It’s not much, but it’s home. I pull into my garage and hop out, dragging my bag with me. I need a beer…or a shot of something. I unlock my door, and as I step inside, I kick my shoes off so they go flying down the hall towards my room.
After dropping my bag by the door and the infamous phone on the table, I head to my kitchen, open my freezer, and pull out the bottle of vodka I keep there in case of emergencies. I don’t have time to find a shot glass, so I pull a coffee mug down from the cupboard, fill it half full, and shoot it back. Practically coughing up a lung as I try to catch my breath, I fill the glass up again and shakily take another shot. This time, I’m prepared for it, so I hold my breath as the burn fills my chest. I put the bottle away, feeling more relaxed already.
I head to my room, strip off my clothes, and put on a T-shirt. It’s early, so I head to the living room, grabbing my phone along the way. I plop down on my couch, put my feet up on the coffee table, turn the TV on, start up the DVR, and press play on The Big Bang Theory. I sit there for a few minutes in a daze, not absorbing even a single second of my favorite show. I look at my cell in my hand, and clicking on the screen, I look at the picture of Jamie. I don’t know why, but I can’t help but smile as I think of Nico’s reaction to it. The tattooed stranger is hot, slightly scary, but definitely interesting.
Nico
I am happy to be home. I have been gone for four days chasing a skip, and I thought it would have taken me a little longer to catch up with the guy, but luckily for me, he was half moron. I’m shutting off my car in front of my townhouse when my phone rings. I look at the caller ID hopefully; I know it’s not going to be sweet Sophie, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want it to be. Kenton’s number flashes on the screen. I’m sure he has another case for me, but right now, that’s not happening. I’m going to have a beer and go to bed, and then tomorrow, I’m going over to the local middle school.
“Yeah,” I answer, pulling my bag out of the backseat.
“Didn’t take you long to catch Johnson.”
“That’s because he’s an idiot,” I tell him. “He hid out at his mom’s house. You would think he would’ve learned his lesson after the last two times I’ve gone after him. Most of the time I was gone was spent on the road getting there and then getting home. When are you going to get a private jet so I don’t have to put miles on my car?”
“Stop bitching. You made fifteen hundred dollars in two days.”
He isn’t wrong. Between selling my part of the construction business back to my brothers and chasing after skips, I am sitting on a nice stack of cash.
“So why are you calling?”
“What? I can’t just call to see how my cousin’s doing?”
“Do I sound stupid to you?”
“All right, all right… The thing is, I need you to help me out with something.”
“What?” I shake my head, making my way up to my door.
“A friend of mine from Vegas called. He has a girl that needs a place to crash for a little while.”
“And what does that have to do with me?”
“Can she stay with you until Cassie gets the rest of her shit out of my house?”
“Hell no!” I bellow as I shove my keys into the lock.
The second the door opens, Daisy starts going wild. I scoop her up in one hand as she begins licking my chin and any other piece of me she can get to.
“You still have that dog?” He laughs, hearing Daisy through the phone.
“Yes,” I growl. All the fuckers in my life think it’s funny I own a little fur-ball for a dog. I rescued Daisy from a flophouse. She was so small at the time that she could fit in the palm of my hand. I was going to give her to one of my family members, but I couldn’t do it. After a week of having her with me, I grew attached to her.