Page 22 of The Shadows We Keep

Let them have their pissing contest. I don’t have time for it. The door slams shut, and the quiet surrounds me as I make the climb up three flights of stairs home.

ELEVEN

HARKIN

My Type (Little Attitude) – Bryce Savage

Last night was like coming home—if home was a person and not the place I abandoned faster than it took for Alina’s life to slip away. Sitting across from Keira in the tiny pizza parlor was refreshing. After a day of wallowing in my self-pity, I stumbled across the street, sobering at that sight of her hunkered down in the corner.

We chatted about nothing, but I’ll hold on to it and replay it like a famous scripture. The minutes ticking away to hours when we were forced from our bubble of sanctitude. If I didn’t already know that Sal treats her like a daughter and nothing else, we would have had a much different conversation after her hasty departure. Her sass eased my irritation, and I made it extensively clear to Sal that I would be around from now on.

Seeing her concealed apartment with the sliver of light peeking through under her curtains offered the reassurance I needed to know she made it home safe. It wasn’t two minutes after I walked back into my apartment that I’d stripped down, my cock ridged against my abs, begging for relief. The steaming water splashes against my back; my hand grips hard around my swollen member, while pictures of her biting her damn lip fill my head. The heat from her earlier stare confirming what her body obstinately betrayed. We may have only met a couple times, but I affected her in the most devious way. She can try denying her body the urges now, but I won’t have it that way much longer.

* * *

The replayof last night clears as my fingers pick up speed. I punch in the code I need to reveal the secrets I’m being paid big money to find and share with my employer. The things I’ve found while sleuthing through the electronic information are mind-blowing. People think they’re doing a bang-up job hiding behind elementary passwords. I don’t ask questions about the content I find, my program identifying the keywords or phrases necessary in the data stream.

My phone pings beside me on the table.

You got it yet?

It’s alwaysthe men who have no clue what I really do that demand results right away. They wouldn’t know a security program from a virus download if I painted it in big red letters in an email to them.

The search runs across my computer, pulling up screen after screen with hits. It’ll take hours to go through the results and pinpoint the pertinent information for my report. But I’d rather sit here in my home office than clock in to a nine-to-five working for some mediocre manager. Freelancing keeps the money rolling in and my hands clean of the reality behind the information requested.

I told you to give me a week. You’ll have your package then.

I type backto the anonymous number and drop my phone back on the desk. It pings back right away, and my irritation grows. But it’s not a text notification staring up at me. I open the map app. The little red dot that floats across the city streets as the black SUV drives her around. I have just enough time to slide on my shoes, snag my keys from the counter, and head out the door.

With the app still pulled up on my phone, I time my stride to reach the front door of the building just as the SUV rounds the corner two blocks down. Jolting across the busy street, I startle as a cab’s horn blares in my ears. The driver throws his arms in the air and silently screams at me from inside the car. I flip him off and keep moving, my sights set on the car that’s now idling against the curb.

I slow as I round the hood, eyes downcast on my phone like I’m out moving through my day, like every other New Yorker in the area. My shoulder checks the back passenger door, halting my progress. The door swings in and a muffled curse meets my ears. Her irritability of my carelessness intended to be shared. But as she finally looks my way, finishing her pleasantries with the driver, our eyes meet and her crass demeanor shifts.

“Harkin?” The pleasant surprise in her tone only enhances my smugness about our time together.

“Keira.” My eyes rake down her body. The tight, leather leggings cling to her short, toned legs. Her creamy skin peeks through the cropped A Day to Remember band T that’s sliced to shreds.

“You know, I didn’t expect a girl like you to have a personal driver in the city.” I’m being a dick; I know it. But watching her squirm under my judgement is too delectable to miss out on.

“I don’t have a driver.” She slams the door and steps into the middle of the sidewalk. I give her a questioning look. “Well, I mean, obviously I do. But I don’t pay for it.” Her weight shifts back and forth on her feet, her bag slung over her slender shoulder.

Well sweetheart, that doesn’t make you seem any less high maintenance.

I don’t fill the silence building between us. Instead, I wait to see if her rambling need for me to understand continues.

I’m not surprised when it does and she says, “I won it.”

Her shoulders deflate at the truth, but not from embarrassment. No, my girl doesn’t want me to associate her with the typical crowd that prefers unnecessary expenses like private cars. She’s too proud, but not stupid enough to refuse the luxury. And that benefits me because now we’re here and can finish what we started last night.

“Well then, lucky you, I guess.” I smile at her, and her eyes light up at my attention.

“Were you heading home?” she asks, shifting the large bag she clutches close to her body. My eyes zone in on the strap, digging in against the delicate arch of her shoulder. Red lines bloom along the edges of the worn leather, marring her unblemished skin.

“I was going to get something to eat. You hungry?” Her eyes drop to a thin, silver watch adorning her wrist. The street light glints off the metal, filling my imagination with scenes of her trussed up to the wall, very different silver bracelets sported on both wrists.

“Were you planning on going far?” she asks.

“Just around the corner to that new pho place.”

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