Page 20 of Aaron (Dresden Pride #1)

“Just that young girl. Telling me not to talk to her that way. Doesn’t she know who I am and what I represent?

No, I won’t allow you to retire me as if I’m some sort of neanderthal.

I’m a modern man with good ways of thinking about the people in this world.

” He told him that it was coming to him, that the men would be there soon to make sure that he got home.

“I’m not leaving, and you can’t make me. ”

Two men and a woman showed up in his office without so much as a knock from any of them.

If he thought that sending a woman to do this to him was going to make him any less pissed off, he was wrong.

The President didn’t know him all that well if he thought that he was going to go easily, either.

There was no way he was going out of the office and being dragged out like some sort of criminal.

“Mr. Gravestone, it’s time for you to leave.

We’re not going to ask you twice. Now come along, or the president said we were to call him and tell him that you’re not cooperating.

” He told him he didn’t give a good goddamn what he was supposed to do.

He wasn’t going to leave under anyone’s power other than his own.

“We’ll have to arrest you if you don’t do as we’re asking you to do. ”

It took the president coming down to his office to make him get out of his domain.

He threatened to take away his pension and his good standing if he didn’t go home.

He was already going to lose his car and his weekly paycheck.

He’d have his retirement, but that wasn’t going to last him that long.

He had things that needed to be paid for.

He and his wife had started out late in life.

Time had come up on him hard when he realized that he was in his late forties and hadn’t started a family to carry on his name.

Even marrying a younger woman, the way that he had, hadn’t gotten him a single child—a son is what he wanted to carry on the name.

Peter didn’t even own a dog; he’d been so caught up in making a name for himself that he’d forgotten to even purchase a house that he’d have for his golden years.

Now he was halfway into his mortgage and still didn’t have enough money saved up to even help with his retirement.

In a word, he’d been stupid with his money.

And now he had nothing to show for even being on this earth but a mortgage to the top run-down house that he’d meant to make repairs on, a wife that didn’t have the sense to come in out of the rain.

No money saved up, very little in a 401K that he could depend on, and a job that he was being tossed aside for because he didn’t believe that a woman had any rights at all, and that children didn’t need to be knocked around a bit to keep them in line. What was he going to do?

He was able to use the car to go straight home.

By the time he’d gotten there, he still had no idea what he was going to do with his life.

His wife would be upset; there would be no more trips to Europe or any other trips to New York for the holidays.

He’d have to tell his step-brother that he couldn’t help him anymore.

This was all a mistake, and he wanted someone to tell him why it was happening to him.

He’d been the best boss he could be for the men in his department.

Not so much the women, but what did they expect him to do when he’d been forced to hire them?

Pamper to their every need? Help them with their job?

His opinion had been that if they were going to work for him, he wasn’t going to cut them any slack.

Nor was he going to let them do anything like the men did because he’d been forced to.

No, they were there to make coffee and do research on things.

If it hadn’t been for having several men off the day that Larry had called, the stupid woman, Mackenzie, wouldn’t have stepped foot out of his department unless she was headed home. Where she should have been all along.

His wife was standing in the doorway when he was let out of the car.

She told him how she’d gotten a call from the president and that he no longer worked for the bureau.

He told her that didn’t mean that he was going to be doing some sort of list of things to do around the house either.

She didn’t much care for that and went back into the kitchen.

Whatever she was doing in there, it had nothing to do with him.

If she thought that he was going in there to look for her, she’d better get that notion out of her head right now.

It wasn’t his domain, and he wasn’t going to step foot in there after all this time.

He only went in there to eat, and that was all.

Now that he was off from work, he wasn’t going to be doing any tidying up or making food for her simply because she might be tired from her job.

He was off against his will, and that was how it was going to be from now on.

~*~

Aaron did kiss Mac before he left the hospital. It was much too short and sweet for his tastes, but they were in a very public setting, and he didn’t want to embarrass her by showing her how much he wanted her. And he did too.

But like he’d said to her before. It was her body and her rules when it came to the two of them making love.

She didn’t believe him; he was sure of that, but he was as honest with her as he could be.

Going home that night, he was going to need a cold shower or some time alone without any interruptions.

People were forever coming to him about one thing or another all the time, and he wanted to just chill for a while and think about the houses that the two of them were going to be looking at tomorrow.

He’d talked to a realtor about the houses that were on the market.

She said that she knew of two more that were being sold by a homeowner that she could get him an appointment to see too.

Aaron didn’t care so long as things moved along quickly so that they could get into something bigger than his tiny apartment.

It was that or they were going to be driving to DC daily—not even possible.

Getting home, he knew that he needed to start packing up things before too much longer.

There really wasn’t that much. He rarely ate at the place, and sleep was all he’d found the place was good for.

He had a single couch that he’d purchased when he’d first moved in.

And there used to be an entire set of dishware that he’d been breaking pieces enough over the years that he had a couple of plates, one bowl, and a cup that he wasn’t even sure went with the set.

Also, he’d had a silverware set that he’d ground a couple of pieces of it in the garbage disposal a few times, as well as simply lost some of it when he’d been using them.

Not enough to start out with having a mate.

His bed was about as old as he was. It had been new when he’d been about ten, and he’d been using it ever since.

He knew that he needed a new one and could well afford it, but things were just coming up, and he’d not been anywhere to get a new one.

It had been on the bottom of his list of things to do for so long that he’d forgotten about it.

There was a dresser that went with his bed that was old and showing wear.

He didn’t even use it anymore, as he’d been living out of laundry baskets, and he knew some of the drawers still stuck.

There was a washer and dryer hookup in his place, but it was another thing that was way down on the bottom of his list, that he’d go to laundry mats rather than do his own laundry at home.

He wasn’t lazy, but too busy to mess with certain things that would more than likely make his life a good deal better than it was now.

Ordering a pizza for his dinner, he decided that he needed to eat healthier too, and needed to go to the store to get things for his place.

He had a, what he knew to be a five-year-old box of cereal in his cabinet that had nothing else and no milk, even if he wanted to try the cereal.

Getting himself a bottle of water to have with his dinner, he began to think of himself as generally stupid when it came to running a household.

If this was any indication, he was going to be in big trouble when he got to a house that he could use.

His only saving grace was that he could cook.

Not perfectly or anything more than a slightly burnt grilled cheese, but he wouldn’t starve to death if he had the ingredients to make a few meals that required a microwave, which he didn’t own, to cook what the instructions said on the side of the box.

He could even do Pop-Tarts if necessary, and he had time to do it.

Getting ready for work, he was nearly dressed the next morning when he heard from his brother, Zeno.

There was a car accident on Maple Avenue, and it required his presence.

He didn’t much care for automobile accidents as they were usually messy and trouble.

There were always two sides to every story when it came to accidents, but they were also too far opposite of one another that it would take him days, if not weeks, to figure out who did what to cause it.

Once he was there, he let the other officers on duty tell him what they thought happened, then talked to the injured parties.

“She just pulled out in front of me like she owned the road.” He wrote down what was being said and nodded to the man who was talking.

“I just washed my car too, and now look at it. It’s going to be weeks before my insurance company gets me another car.

What the hell am I supposed to do now?” Her story was a bit different.