Page 20 of Hold Me Until Morning

An SUV with Sheriff stamped on the side passed me coming the opposite direction, and I glanced into the rearview mirror to gauge what the car would do.

Only it was gone, no longer visible behind me.

I blinked then looked again.

Shaken.

Confused.

Wondering if paranoia had me making the whole thing up.

Conjuring a danger that wasn’t there.

But maybe I was nothing but a fool for thinking that danger hadn’t followed me here.

FIVE

CODY

“You are the luckiest motherfucker I know.”

I grinned at my best friend’s voice coming through the line as I pulled a fresh tee over my head. A shower had been more than required after I’d gotten home covered in sweat and dirt after I’d spent the day tearing out the old decks to make room for the new.

“Come now, Ryder, were they really going to pick anyone else? Have you met me?” I laid it on thick, my cell propped between my ear and my shoulder as I ran a towel through my wet mop of hair.

“Of course not. You go flashing that grin, and women tend to fall at your feet. Who’d you dip your dick in to get your way?” he razzed.

“You wound me, man. That contract didn’t have a thing to do with my sex appeal and everything to do with my raw, crazy talent.”

Dude had been giving me shit about winning this contract since I’d told him about it two months ago. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was jealous, but really, we just loved to bust each other’s balls.

“Besides, you know I don’t mix business with pleasure,” I added.

I couldn’t tell you the number of times I’d been working a job and a housewife had invited me in for a glass of lemonade.

Fuck no.

That was a sure-fire way to lose everything I’d built.

Hailey’s face flashed through my mind.

Undoubtedly, I’d crossed a line I shouldn’t have, seeking her out earlier today.

I’d made the excuse that I needed to take a piss, and I’d slipped into the stables.

There was no question in my mind that I was pushing boundaries.

If she wanted to, I bet she could go to her supervisor and claim I’d been harassing her, and I’d be booted off the property, some fine print making that contract nil.

Buh-bye five million dollars.

And I was the idiot who’d done it, anyway.

Apparently, I was losing my goddamn mind when it came to her.

But there it was, nagging at the back of my mind.

The oldest kind of guilt and want, that time so fucked up that I still didn’t know how to process it. I’d done my best to put it behind me, but there it was, luring me to a place that I knew better than to go.

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