Page 139 of Dark Love

Me: I’m just heading to the club now to talk to my tech guy.

Dahlia: Have fun at work.

Does anyone have fun at work?

Payne: Can we talk?

That’s not good.

Me: Meet at the club in 20?

I’m headed there anyway to talk to Shock.

Payne: Can’t. Imogene isn’t up to going out.

Payne needs me to step in. This isn’t healthy for him. He barely survived his own trauma. He doesn’t need to fight through this woman’s. Payne rescued her. Now it’s time for doctors to do the rest. I’m going to make that happen, even if I need to drag her out of his place after I knock him out.

Me: I need to get with Shock first. Then I’ll head to your place.

This day gets worse and worse.

An afternoon in bed with a good book and a beautiful woman seems like nothing but a dream right now.

***

Shock is strange. He’s the quintessential nerd, brilliant with computers, terrible with everything else, including remembering to pay a bill. Hence the reason we have him stashed in a loft space above a club. After his third eviction, it just seemed easier if we handled the rest of his life for him and let him focus on what he does best.

Which certainly isn’t cleaning. I climb over the mountain of empty cans and takeout containers on the way to Shock’s office.

The cleaners need to come up here daily, it seems.

Has Shock left his chair in the last week?

It’s an amazing chair to be fair. He can literally recline it to the point where his feet are above his head. It vaguely resembles the chair you find in a dentist’s office, only with more bells and whistles than you’d find on a space shuttle.

“Shock.”

“Hey, Vex.” Shock doesn’t turn away from the nine screens he’s currently watching. One is the security feed. Another seems to be scrolling lines of code. Is he playing two different games at the same time?

Don’t ask. You don’t want to know. Once Shock goes off on a tangent explaining a game or some nerdy topic, there’s no getting him back. “I need some information.”

“Everything is fine at the club.”

We have a procedure in place if it wasn’t that doesn’t include me coming up to Shock’s little world. “I need a background check.”

Shock’s fingers stop moving. “How fast?”

“Before he sells another woman would be good.”

The space chair swings around. “You think he’s solo, or are we looking at an operation here?”

“Not sure. The name is Eamon Plant. And his girlfriends seem to disappear.”

“Ahh. It’s going to take a week.”

He always says that. “What do you need to make it go faster?”

“Can’t. It’s impossible.”

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