Playing for Keeps Read online

  Knowing that wasn’t an idle threat, Sadie grabbed a taco in each hand. “Thanks,” she said and took a huge bite, watching as Rocco dropped to his knees and tried to bribe Lollipop closer with a piece of chicken.

  Lollipop’s first move was her usual I don’t trust you growl.

  “No, pretty girl, you like me, remember?” Rocco held the meat out, patient in a way he never was with humans.

  Lollipop took the chicken—she wasn’t stupid—and then allowed him to pet her.

  Sadie looked around for dessert, hoping there was a badly needed sugar rush in her future.

  “Used to be you tried to stay away from men and desserts. Now . . .” Rocco gave her a look. “You’ve fallen off the wagon, chica.”

  “Thought you learned your lesson,” Blue said over his taco.

  “Apparently not.” Mini Moe had opinions too. “Even though she’s on a self-imposed man embargo.”

  Working in a shop with alpha men, she’d learned early to hold her own with them and stared them all down to let them know this wasn’t up for discussion. She might be the youngest, but she was for sure the mightiest. “Do not need the peanut gallery’s opinion on this.”

  Mini Moe met her gaze, winced, and went back to his tacos. Blue was next and he rolled his eyes, grumbled something about stupid millennials, and went back to eating.

  “If you think millennials are stupid,” she said, “then do not ever again ask me to fix the printer or laptop.”

  Rocco just shook his head. “I have a point,” he said. “That is that Wes devastated you. I told you what we’d do to the next guy who hurt you. You should know, nothing’s changed there, no matter who he is, rich dude or not.”

  Mini Moe nodded.

  Blue nodded.

  And Sadie blew out a sigh. “Wes didn’t devastate me, the situation did. And that was three years ago. I’m stronger now, and no longer that stupid. No one could get to me like that again.”

  “He set you back,” Rocco said stubbornly. “He set you back in your recovery.”

  “Momentarily,” she agreed. “But I got a handle on it, I’ve had a handle on it, and I’ve been fine for a long time.”

  At his mouth quirk, she smiled. “Okay, so ‘fine’ is relative. We all know I’ll never be the world’s definition of fine, but I’m something even better. I’m my version of fine.”

  Rocco finally smiled. “Can’t argue with that.” Snagging her around the neck with a beefy arm, he pulled her in for a quick hug.

  She hugged him back, knowing he was worried. But she knew she didn’t need his worry. She was fine. And luckily the discussion was now over because her first client of the day walked in.

  Cal was a local PI and a repeat customer. He’d been her first client, one of Rocco’s early referrals, and though she worked with mostly women now, she had a fondness for Cal because he’d been her first. They’d become friends over the past few years as she’d worked on his sleeve. Today he was having her work on the American flag low on his hipbone, and as always, once she got started, he began to talk to distract himself from the pain.

  Today the topic was his current girlfriend, who he thought might be cheating on him.

  “If you think there’s something going on,” she said, “there’s something going on.”

  “I don’t know for sure.”

  She lifted her head and looked at him. “Come on. You know.”

  He blew out a breath. “Yeah. Maybe. She said I could go through her phone and see for myself though.”

  “If you do it, don’t bother looking for messages from guys,” she said. “Look for her and her BFF’s text messages. The good shit’s in there, trust me.”

  He sighed. “It’s hard to meet the good ones.”

  “That’s because they don’t usually frequent the dives you frequent. Go to Target. The female to male ratio is ten to one and they’re already looking for things they don’t need.”

  He laughed and rubbed a hand over his eyes.

  “You’re tired,” she said.

  “I’m on a case I hate. A couple getting divorced and they’re fighting over custody of their three kids. The husband wants physical proof she’s cheating.”

  “Seems to be the theme of the day.”

  “Yeah.” He shook his head. “I got the proof, unfortunately—a recording of her having sex with someone else.” He brought something up on his phone.

  It was a recording. A woman was moaning softly.

  “Maybe she’s just eating something good,” Sadie said. “Like cheesecake.”

  He gave her a look of disbelief.

  “Hey,” she said. “I moan like that when I’m eating cheesecake. The right cheesecake’s better than sex.”

  “Baby doll, then you’re not having the right kind of sex.”

  No kidding. She was having zero sex.

  The moaning on the recording got a little louder and then there was a softly panted “oh yeah, right there . . . that’s it, don’t stop, please God, don’t stop!”

  Sadie froze. She hated the word triggered, but that’s exactly what happened to her. She was thrown back to a time she didn’t want to revisit, but her mind didn’t care. “Turn it off,” she whispered. She pointed at his phone. “Stop it.” Her heart was pounding and she was having trouble drawing in enough air. She felt . . . icky. And ashamed. Not a good combination for her. Horrified, she pushed Cal. “Turn. It. Off,” she said again, or she thought she did, but she actually wasn’t sure the words came out. Her reaction was startling, even to herself, but that they were taking this woman’s life out of context, making it dirtier than it was, seemed incredibly wrong and unfair.

  And Sadie knew all about things not being fair.

  Very few people knew about her past. She knew if people did know, she’d be judged just as she’d judged the woman on the tape. And at the thought, a renewed rush of blood roared in her ears and her limbs went leaden, and she knew exactly what it was. The therapist she’d seen for five years had laid it out for her.

  An impending anxiety attack.

  And Cal still hadn’t turned off the tape. She snatched his phone, tapped the screen to cut it off and stared at him, breathing a little too hard. Shaking her head, she moved around the cot to walk away, needing a moment. She yanked the curtain aside and—

  Came face-to-face with Caleb.

  Lollipop was at his side, looking very happy. Not Caleb. His usual easygoing expression was nowhere in view. His eyes were tight, his mouth a little grim as he took in the sight of her. He looked beyond her to Cal still sprawled out in her chair, shirt off, pants unzipped and dangerously low on his hips, which had been the point since that’s what she’d been working on.

  She turned back to Caleb, who’d turned away without a word and was heading to the door.

  What the hell?

  “Sadie,” Cal said behind her, sitting up. “I’m sorry. I clearly hit a nerve for you and I . . . I’m sorry. I was out of line.” He shoved his phone away. “You okay?”

  She swiped a hand over her eyes and realized that her hand was shaking. “Yes.”

  “Is that your boyfriend? I think he thought we were the ones having sex.”

  She stared at him and then whipped out of the cubicle. “Hey,” she called to Caleb.

  He had Lollipop on a leash and with one hand on the door, he craned his neck and met her gaze, eyes unreadable and cool, mouth grim and tight.

  Yep. Cal was right. That was exactly what Caleb thought, that she’d been having sex. With a client. At work. With other people in the place.

  Unbelievable.

  There were so many, many things wrong with that, she saw red. Furious, she strode across the floor until she was right in his face. Which was far better than shaking like a coward who didn’t like to face her own dark, secret, twisty past.

  But now that she was standing there right in front of him, so much bubbling inside her that she thought she might implode, she couldn’t find any words.

  Caleb