Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 134830 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 134830 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 674(@200wpm)___ 539(@250wpm)___ 449(@300wpm)
He looks back at me over his shoulder, his anger not quite matching mine but damn close to the nuclear-fallout level coursing through my veins. I don’t have time to worry about his apologies and ‘I didn’t mean to cause problems’, though, because I have to figure out what I’m going to do.
CHAPTER 28
KYLE
That night when I send the guys home, I go to Dani’s door, ready for a bitch session where we share our thoughts on how awful Kathy is and pretend-plot some awful ways to get back at her.
I’m leaning toward posting a fake estate sale at her house that starts at six a.m. with a note to please ring the bell repeatedly because the sale holder is hearing-impaired. I’m picturing a line full of the dedicated, hardcore buyers lined up on her precious front yard, ringing her bell over and over, and then yelling at her when she opens the door so that she can ‘hear’ them. And then, they’ll yell even more when they find out the sale is a fake.
Am I gonna do that? No. Not because it’s wrong, but because it involves the shoppers and it’s not their fault Kathy’s a bitch.
Is it fun to imagine? Fuck, yeah.
But Dani’s front door is closed. I knock, but instead of Dani answering the door, I hear the music turn up louder inside.
This is what we’re doing?
I’m surprised at Dani. If she’s mad, especially at me, I would fully expect her to come at me with both barrels firing. Conflict avoidance doesn’t seem like her style. Conflict provocation is more how she rolls.
So I go around to the side door, the one that opens up to the patio in dispute. But it’s closed too. And when I peer in the window, I can’t see Dani.
I bang even harder there. But she doesn’t come to the door.
I text her… Open the door, Daniela.
I get the notification that she’s seen the message, but she leaves me on read. Three little dots don’t appear like she’s considering answering me, and the door doesn’t so much as rattle.
My anger renewed now, and directed more at myself and Dani than Kathy for the moment, I stomp to my truck and climb inside. I slam my palm to the steering wheel, glance at her house one more time, and then drive away, going too fast but not giving a fuck.
“You sure about this?” Wayne asks me for the third time.
I sigh heavily, wishing there were some other way, but there’s not and believe me, I spent all night thinking about it after roaring away from Dani’s house yesterday. “Yeah, take it down. Let’s get this over with.”
Zeus and Frogger walk along the chain link with snips, cutting the wire connectors that hold the sections of fencing to the top rail. But they keep one eye on their work and one eye on Dani’s back door.
We’re all expecting her wrath.
And though she comes outside, her mere presence causing Zeus and Frogger to scurry over and hide behind me and Wayne, she doesn’t say a single word to us. She just sends a narrow-eyed glare at each of us individually, though mine is a special delivery with a bonus snarl. I’m almost disappointed I don’t get a fuck-you finger or two.
She goes back inside, and Frogger shivers like he’s freezing cold, though we’re working in the hot morning sun. “Fuck, that chick is scary as hell.” He laughs as he says it, but I whirl, grabbing his shirt and clutching it in my fist as I hold him nose to nose with me.
“Do not ever speak about her like that again. She’s not a chick,” I grit out.
Frogger grins, his hands out placatingly. “Just teasing, man. Sorry.” I toss him away, and he wipes his hands over his shirt, smoothing it, and then shakes out his mullet like it might’ve gotten mussed too. I think he’s done, but then he looks up at me through his lashes and whispers, “Fine, she’s not a chick. But you didn’t deny the scary part.”
I make a lunging step toward him and he flinches. He thinks this is our usual shit-talking and teasing, the same as any other time we’ve given each other a hard time, but it’s different this time. Because it’s about Dani.
“Frogger, if you have a lick of self-preservation, shut the fuck up,” Wayne advises, reading my mood better than anyone.
But Zeus is getting involved now, albeit more earnestly. “Did you tell her the fence thing isn’t your fault?” he asks. “She has to understand that, right?” The full display of his youthful innocence would be cute any other time. Right now, it’s one more reminder that when the shit hits the fan, Dani goes to war with the world alone. No matter whether she has people in her corner or not. She’ll shut them out and handle things herself because she thinks she has to, or feels like she needs to, to prove herself.