Page 39 of Property of Azrael

“I thought you liked them?”

“No.” I laugh bursts past my lips, and Eden stares at the two of us, unsure of what she’s witnessing. “If he offers you a snack, turn it down. Trust me.”

“Oh, come on,” Fox retorts. “It was strawberry. I didn’t give you banana flavored. That’s how you’d know I didn’t like you.”

“I don’t want that in any flavor. No one does.” Eden continues to stare. “Don’t ask,” I tell her. “You really don’t want to know.”

“I think I do, though.”

“I’ll show you later,” he snickers. “So, about this dinner…”

Eden pulls up the hotel restaurant menus. It takes a bit of negotiation before we find a place that has something we’ll all eat. We make our selections and place our order online for delivery to our room. While we wait for our food to arrive, Eden heads off to shower and change out of her signing outfit.

I take that time to text Melinda. It takes a couple of drafts, and some advice from Fox, until I finally perfect it.

Hey, Melinda, I have some bad news. I ran into some car trouble on my road trip, and my car is still in the shop. It looks like I may have to take the entire week off. I am so sorry for the late notice. I’ll have my laptop with me if anything pressing pops up.

She responds almost immediately.

Thanks for letting me know. We should be okay next week. I can always pull in one temp if we have any issues. Safe travels.

“That was easy, but I hate that. I sort of lied to my boss to get extra time off.”

“Happens all the time,” Fox assures me. “Though, it’s hard for me to lie to my boss about shit when he’s your club president. When he’s had a shit day, you have a shit day. No excuse not to show up.”

“I bet that sucks. My boss is pretty easy to work with, unless she’s had one of her days with her husband.”

“You have no idea, sugar. Maybe with you around, he’ll loosen up a bit.”

“Why would I make him loosen up?” The question comes out before I can stop it. Creeping into Azrael’s personal life isn’t like me, though having a secondary perspective is interesting. I may have slept with him this morning, but there’s still a lot I don’t know about him.

“Az doesn’t date Hallie. He works, and well, club life. That’s it.”

I start to press him for more information, but Fox raises his hand, stopping me. “It’s not my story to tell, Hallie. He’ll tell you when and if he’s ready.”

“Way to be vague. Now all I want to do is ask him about it.”

Azrael is handsome and successful, if Eden’s research is to be trusted. Women love those qualities in a man. If he’s not dating, it’s not for lack of opportunity. Hell, I caught a few ladies this morning trying to slip him their room number. I’d seen them try it with all the guys at one point or another. If it weren’t for me, he’d have had the pick of the event litter.

“I wouldn’t,” he warns. “Let him tell you.”

Pulling up my message from Azrael, my earlier text has still gone unread.

“Have you heard from him?”

Fox shifts his gaze from his phone over to me. “I haven’t.” He goes back to his phone, typing away with a grimace on his face. I watch him closely, his brows furrowing with every passing minute.

“Is everything okay, Fox?”

The feeling that he’s hiding something from me is only growing. What it could be, I don’t have a clue. Yet there’s something off about him. Off about Azrael being gone. He barely left me alone to breathe, and now he’s gone without telling me where.

“Of course,” he mutters.

“You seem preoccupied.”

“Sorry. Talking to Van.”

“Has he heard about my car?”

---