Page 23 of Rosabel and the Billionaire Beast

“Still haven’t found anything new on Wolf Industries,” River said. “I’ve been searching in my spare time—though with my boss’s demands, I admittedly don’t have much of that.”

Wolf Industries had targeted Adrian’s business first, stealing his clients left and right. Then it had apparently disbanded when The Informant—aka Ulrich—had started targeting us. We hadn’t heard anything more from the shady business, but we still wanted to keep a step ahead should anything else happen, what with the wolf-themed vandalism that had taken place at Wonderland a few months ago.

“Maybe Duncan could see if Rosabel could find anything,” Maddox suggested. “She seems like she’s got plenty of spare time.”

“She quit,” I muttered, hating the words.

Adrian lifted his gaze to the screen. A little cooing noise came through from somewhere beside him. “She quit?”

“I kind of told her to.”

“Why would you let go of the one good thing you have going on in your life?” Hawk’s face took over.

I slid my gaze to him. I wasn’t going to answer that, not when he already read as much in my expression every time I was in the same room with Rosabel.

He knew I was mad for her. They all did.

“You’re kidding,” Maddox said. “You let her go because of one secret note?”

“No, that’s not why,” I said. The words rumbled from my chest like a landslide.

Maddox had been the one I’d gone to after the threat had appeared in my mailbox. I’d raged, bashing into his office and smashing my fist into his wall. Hitting things was how I coped, and I hadn’t had a punching bag handy. He knew better than any of these guys how much that note had scared me.

I know how you feel about her, it had said.

Letting her go would be the right thing to do. If she wasn’t in my life, she wouldn’t be in danger. If she wasn’t the object of all my attention and even those of my cells—whose only functionwas to keep my body fully operational so I could see her again—I wouldn’t have to worry about anyone targeting her.

No. I’d just have to worry about some other drooling idiot like the last one she’d dated pursuing her. Marrying her. Taking her from me in a different and even more unbearable way.

At the thought of Pete, my defenses heightened. Ugh. Please no. I hoped she didn’t go crawling back to that loser.

“She accused me of taking her for granted,” I said, straddling the chair that faced my desk. I rested my elbows on the chair back and raked my fingers through my hair.

“Do you?” Maddox asked.

I glared at him. “What kind of question is that?”

“Simple,” Hawk said. “When was the last time you told her you appreciate all she does for you?”

“Do I have to say it out loud?” I muttered.

That much was clear when her replacement came that morning and the woman offered me a Styrofoam cup—acup!—of bitter coffee.

I’d snapped at her to get me some cream and to put it in an actual mug. She didn’t come back.

It was just as well. Not everyone could banter like Rosie. She would have told me to get my own cream. She would have made some kind of remark about gathering more flies with honey than vinegar or something stupid like that.

And then there were the cubicle giraffes and the circulating rumors about why Rosabel had left. Unlike the other gossip that made the rounds, this had been anything but quiet.

There’d been glances.

There’d been conversations that had come to abrupt halts at my approach, joined with the unmistakable sense that I’d interrupted something that had nothing to do with their jobs and everything to do with me.

“He barked at her one too many times, if you ask me,” Gale had muttered to Isla from within their shared cubicle. “Rosabel always insisted nothing was going on between them.”

“It’s got to be more personal, though. Have you seen the way he watches her? And the way she looks at him?”

I’d rested an arm on the cubicle’s ledge and peered down at the blonde and brunette heads clustered together, their computer screens completely ignored.

---