Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68937 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68937 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 345(@200wpm)___ 276(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Val, however, was the lone holdout.
“I was wondering if you could open the doctor’s sleeping lounge for me. I wanted to go scare the shit out of my brother,” I teased.
Her eyes twinkled as she got up and walked to the door.
Val smiled at Copper, who nodded back at her in greeting.
“Just don’t tell him I’m the one that let y’all in,” she whispered as she ran her badge to open the door.
Copper caught the door and quietly pushed it open.
And, as if we were on the same page like we were when we were teens, Copper and I both took a running start toward the bed that was in the corner of the room.
A masculine curse, followed by a panicked squeak of surprise from a female throat, had both Copper and I pulling back.
A light switched on, and suddenly I was losing all the color in my face.
“Chevy,” I breathed. “What the fuck are you thinking?”
Copper didn’t say anything to the woman that he was straddling, most likely because he couldn’t form words.
“Shit,” Chevy said. “Copper…”
But Copper was up and moving out of the room in the next breath.
Chevy cursed and pulled away, practically throwing me to the floor in his haste to get to our brother.
I stood up on shaky legs when I saw Reign Lake staring at me with shocked eyes.
Her eyes were bloodshot, and her face was ashen.
“Was that Copper?” she asked breathily.
I swallowed hard. “Yep.”
“Fuck,” she breathed as she scrambled up.
I noticed that she was in hospital scrubs that were two sizes too small for her, as she made her way to her shoes in the corner of the room.
Her shoes, however, were what caught my attention.
They were covered in what looked like rusty red…
“Is that blood?” I asked.
Reign’s shoulders drooped. “Yeah.”
“What’s going on, Reign?” I pushed.
She swallowed hard and stared at her shoes for a long moment before she said, “I was in a car accident.”
“What happened?” I asked just as the door to the lounge opened back up and Chevy came back inside.
I looked from Chevy to Reign, back to Chevy.
“Explain,” I snapped at the two of them.
I didn’t care that Reign was in an accident. What I cared about was how my brother was looking at the woman that I would’ve sworn on my life would’ve ended up with Copper.
“Shit.” Chevy ran his hands over his face. “It’s…”
“Complicated,” Reign finished.
I looked from her to Chevy and said, “We just got him back, Chevy.”
Chevy looked sick. “I know.”
“Fix it,” I said. Then I turned to Reign and said, “Copper officially just moved into your building.”
Oh, and you’re about to start working for us…
She deflated. “Fuck.”
I turned to Chevy.
“Don’t be stupid, Chevy. If this is what you want, fine. But don’t be fuckin’ stupid.” I gathered my shoe that’d fallen off, slipped it onto my foot, and walked out.
I walked straight to the place we’d been intending to go eat at and purchased some pastries, then I made my way back to the office.
I found Copper in his office, staring at the wall.
“I loved her with my whole heart,” he said. “Still do…”
I placed the pastries on the desk in front of him and said, “You need to talk to Chevy.”
“If I talk to Chevy right now, I might hurt him, and he doesn’t deserve that,” he confessed.
“Then what are you going to do?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
I left him alone after that, reaching for my phone the minute I left his office.
I called Dima since I still hadn’t heard from him, and a strange man answered the phone.
“Hello?” the older man answered.
I frowned, then immediately got defensive. “Um, what’s going on? This is my husband’s phone.”
“Do you mean boyfriend?” He chuckled. “So it went like this…”
If you don’t tell your woman that she’s beautiful, a random artificial intelligence guy on social media will.
—Dima to Shasha
DIMA
“Sir,” I heard said carefully. “Semyonov’s wife is here, and she’s mad.”
My brows rose.
Wife.
I liked that word.
“I don’t really care,” Chester said as he crossed his arms over his chest. “And she’s not his wife. She’s his girlfriend.”
“Regardless of her name and title, she’s very mad. And the lawyer not being allowed in the room isn’t helping that,” the young FBI agent stated.
I was fairly sure that he was new, or he wouldn’t have questioned ‘Special Agent Chester Brown.’
The special agent narrowed his eyes and said, “Get out, Crew.”
Crew shook his head and said, “I’m not going down for this. You come out here and deal with this, or I’m going above your head.”
Wow, the balls on young Crew.
I liked him already.
Chester cursed and pushed away from the table.
We’d been sitting here for two hours now. He’d been asking questions, and I’d been declining to answer without my lawyer present.
It was a vicious cycle that was spiraling down into the toilet the longer that I sat there.