Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 106312 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 532(@200wpm)___ 425(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106312 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 532(@200wpm)___ 425(@250wpm)___ 354(@300wpm)
CHAPTER 34
Eli
I’m sitting in my car outside her apartment building. I texted her to warn her I was on the way, and she told me not to come up and that she’ll meet me down here.
I’ve been waiting for over thirty minutes.
No sign of her.
I try calling.
No answer.
I message.
No answer.
I huff in frustration. I have tried to do the “patient and chivalrous” thing, which is so uncomfortable and out of character for me, and I’m now pissed for even trying, especially when I’m rewarded with her silence.
Pocketing my phone, I leave my car and am heading inside the building, when I receive a notification that someone has entered my apartment. Pausing outside Jewel’s door, I open the app for the cameras I had set up and see someone wearing all black, walking around my private space. I watch as they go to my fridge, pull out a piece of cheese, and eat it as they open every door, then close them, leaving everything the exact same way. That’s when the intruder turns, amber eyes staring directly at the camera I had installed just because of her. She has the fucking audacity to wave before she continues her search.
She’s trying to find her guns.
Good luck to you, tigress; that’s not going to happen anytime soon.
This little vixen actually has the balls to not only lie to me about her whereabouts and pretend she’s taking her time to meet me but to break into my apartment again. I’m just now realizing that perhaps my approach of having minimal security personnel besides Ford and Hawke, might have been a miscalculation, especially when it comes to this sneaky woman.
My other camera indicates motion detected as she walks into my bedroom. She spins dramatically and then throws herself backward onto the bed with a smile, her knee-high-boot-clad feet kicking into the air before they land on my bed.
“Jewel,” I say into the microphone. She offers me a small wave as she lounges on my bed. “Get your shoes off my bed.” She laughs but doesn’t do as she’s told. Of course she doesn’t. I would expect nothing less from her.
Flipping onto her stomach, she gives me a perfect view of her ass in those leather pants as she crawls to my bedside table. She proceeds to pull open the drawer and then wreaks havoc on the contents. My jaw tics. She’s purposefully fucking with me because she knows I like things in a particular way.
She finds something and lifts it toward the camera, showing me what she has.
A condom.
“Guess you won’t be needing this,” she says, opening it and throwing it to the floor so it can’t be used again. Not that I ever bring women to my apartment. That condom has probably been sitting in there for years.
She rolls over with an exhausted sigh. “Where are my guns?” she asks, getting to her knees and eyeing the camera.
“Meet me at the dress shop, and I may give you one,” I tell her. She rolls her eyes, and I can’t help the smile that teases my lips.
Her apartment door opens, drawing me back to where I am, and her roommate is startled when she almost runs into me.
I drop my phone into my jacket pocket, aware of where I have to go next.
“Oh, she isn’t here,” she tells me before I can say a word.
“I know.”
“Okay, then.” She steps into the hallway, locks the door, double-checks that it’s locked, then walks around me.
She’s a strange one.
I pull my phone back out and check the cameras again. Jewel is lazily curled up on my bed, playing with the remote and trying to get the TV working.
“Jewel Diamond, we have an appointment today,” I remind her.
“I don’t give a fuck. I have my period. I hurt. And I still don’t like you, asshole.” She flips me off.
I crack my neck from side to side. It’s about time I teach her a lesson… in obedience.
When I arrive at my apartment, I find her right where I saw her last—on my bed. I go to speak, then notice she’s fallen asleep. I drop the plastic bag of chocolate, pads, tampons, and something called period undies, which I don’t entirely understand the need for, onto the dresser. As much as I want to punish her for being a brat, I still feel a pang of guilt—not something I’ve ever felt before—for how I spoke to her last night.
A soft snore leaves her.
Fucking hell.
I pull off one of her boots, and when I get to the second, she startles awake, kicks me in the chest, and basically crawls up the bed, ready for a fight.
“What the actual fuck?” I shout, rubbing my chest.
She lays her hand over her heart and starts breathing heavily. “You scared me.”
“Yeah, well, you broke into my house and fell asleep in my bed. What are you, Goldilocks or something?”