Page 53 of Unbearable
“Tell Ethan bye for me. Call me anytime you need me to keep him, but I don’t want to be in the middle of whatever problems you and my sister are having. Thanks for dinner.” She turned before he could answer and walked quickly for the door.
He debated chasing after her, but knew he’d only make everything worse. She was right. He needed to get his shit together. Either he dug in and worked it out with Brooke, or he left.
He slumped back down in the booth. It had been tempting to change Bailey’s mind in to staying, but that wasn’t fair. He couldn’t always fix the mess he was embroiled in by forcing a different outcome.
If there was one person he didn’t want to alter their mood, it was Bailey. She was never anything but sweet and loving. In other words, she was already pretty perfect.
Standing back up, he collected the trash and dumped it in the trash can. He wrapped up the bag with Ethan’s meal. Pushing into the playscape, he searched the tubes until he saw Ethan playing with a couple of other kids.
“Time to go, buddy.”
“Awww,” Ethan complained, but he slid down one of the slides to meet Fox. “I made some new friends.”
“That’s great.” Fox held out his hand for Ethan to take. Together they walked out to the work truck.
“Where’s Aunt Bailey?”
“She had to run. She said to tell you she had fun.”
“I don’t think she did,” he answered. Fox stopped wrestling the seat belt that went over his seat.
“Why do you think that?”
“Because she was sad.”
“Did she say why she was sad?”
“She said she wasn’t when I asked, but I think that was a fib. She just acted sad.” Fox finished buckling Ethan in and climbed into the front. He knew there was a good chance he was the reason she was sad. Why hadn’t he picked up on it when she walked in? He heard Ethan open his food in the back seat.
He debated briefly about which direction he should go. Should he go to Bailey’s? But he couldn’t think of how the situation could be made any better. A simple conversation wasn’t going to do it. Finally, he turned toward home. It was his only option.
CHAPTER 20
Brooke steppedinto the pub and looked around. She had some unfinished business to deal with during her lunch break. The last couple of days had been more than she could reasonably be expected to deal with.
First, she had rushed to the courthouse when her ex-husband was arrested. Then she got into a fight with Fox, though she still didn’t get the whole blood gushing thing.
Demanding to know where Ethan was had almost been the last straw. Her sister asking really had been. Edmund had finally insisted she send Bailey the information on where he was so they would stop calling.
Edmund hadn’t even acted excited to see her. It was the first time she had found an entitled jerk on her own. Except he had pointed out that the guy was just some useless schmuck right out of prison. He had been furious, but for the first time, he’d let her strap the man into the machine.
Soon, he would see her as a partner instead of just his assistant. His honeytrap, for lack of a better term. Perhaps he would even let her reverse their roles on occasion.
Then there was her sister, Bailey. She was positive Fox was fucking her on the side. Normally, she wouldn’t give two shitswhat her sister did. Sneaking around with her boyfriend, no matter how she felt about him, was unacceptable though.
Bailey would get hers in the end if Brooke had anything to do with it. The bitch should know better than to cross her.
Today, she just wanted to start setting things right again. Her life had been quiet, until Knox had arrived in town and begin interfering in her ex-husband’s business.
Looking around again, she finally spotted him sitting in a booth toward the back with a mound of food in front of him. He had a notebook opened next to his plate and wrote something in it every few bites.
“Two pints of whatever you have that’s good on draft,” she said when the bartender stepped over to her. The pints arrived, and she took them over to the booth. She sat one in front of him as she slid into the seat opposite.
If he was surprised to see her, it didn’t show. In fact, he kept writing in his notebook for several more seconds before looking up.
“Brooke,” Knox said like it was simply a statement of fact. She took a long sip of her beer. It wasn’t to her taste, but she doubted the Neanderthal sitting across from her drank anything else.
She watched him closely. Her shirt was carefully chosen this morning to present the best cleavage. If his eyes went straight to it, she knew she could charm him into doing what she wanted.