Page 50 of Gentle Fox

Shit! Of course I shouldn’t have been using my personal email in a security firm. I never thought anything of it because I didn’t have any other way to check it. I needed to rectify that.

“I’m sorry, I should’ve known better.”

Nolen was kind enough to shake his head. “Please don’t blame yourself. We were so happy to have you here we just threw the job at you with no explanations. This is one hundred percent my and Maverick’s fault.”

He was too damn sweet for his own good. Nolen could’ve been blaming me, but he wasn’t, and it made me feel better about my choice to stay on here as an employee.

“So they got my location from the email. What now?”

All three men exchanged looks but it was Owen who spoke up. “Now we wait for Lex to check in. He’s following them to see where they plan to stay. There’s nowhere in town for them, so the first guess would be Addison which is thirty minutes away. If that’s the case, someone will be watching them around the clock to see what move they plan to make. If they don’t attempt to come to you, we’ll go to them. It’s better to get ahead of things rather than be reactive.”

I didn’t particularly like the plan, but it made sense. I much preferred to never speak to Dennis again, but based on the nonsense he and his mother were spreading, I didn’t have that option.

“If you think that’s best.”

It was Hendrix who responded this time, and back was his goofy personality. “Don’t sound so thrilled. I mean I get it, kicking him to the curb sounds like a much better idea, but then we wouldn’t learn anything. I don’t know about you but I’m a curious fucker. I like a good mystery as much as the next guy, but only if I can solve it in the end.”

I smiled at him. “It would annoy the crap out of me to never know what really happened.”

“That’s the spirit.” He threw his arm around my shoulder. “Now why don’t you convince Owen to get you out of here for the day. I’m sure he can think of better ways to spend the afternoon with you.” Hendrix winked at me, and Owen growled at his friend.

The whole encounter was hilarious and vastly improved my mood.

“Yes, I have a better way to spend the day than with you idiots.” Owen tugged me away from Hendrix and tucked me into his side. I gladly snuggled in. I would never complain about getting to be wrapped up in him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Owen

Annalee and I sat on the couch, her feet nestled in my lap with a pint of ice cream and two spoons sitting between us.

“You know,” she said, digging a chunk of ice cream out with her spoon, “when you said you had a better way to spend the afternoon, I had something completely different in mind.”

I watched as she shoved a large spoonful of rocky road ice cream into her mouth and moaned around the icy cold goodness.

I knew exactly what she and my friends thought we would be doing when we got home. That was exactly why I went for the ice cream first.

“Oh, don’t get me wrong. I fully plan to get you naked sooner rather than later, but I figured I would feed that sweet tooth of yours first. Plus, I wanted to make sure you were okay. Today was an emotional mess from the moment you woke up.”

I was no longer a horny teenager who only thought with my dick. I cared enough about her emotions to put sex on the back burner for a little while longer.

Annalee swallowed her current bite and waved her spoon at me. “And this is why I’m smitten with you.”

I smiled at her. “Oh yeah? Any why’s that?”

“Because you care about me and like me as a person, not just my body or what I can do for you. Over the years, I’ve had friends and even guys I was interested in that, as soon as they found out how much I was worth, it suddenly became about what I could do for them. You’re not like that.”

I wanted to kick everyone’s ass who ever made her feel that she was only worthy because of her money. Those people deserved a beatdown.

I shoved my spoon deep into the pint of ice cream and pulled her legs so that they were lying flat and I could rub her feet. “Those people didn’t deserve you. They didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as you. I’m glad they’re no longer in your life. Otherwise I would be in jail for the number of people’s asses I would be kicking.”

Annalee shoved her spoon next to mine and placed the pint of ice cream on the coffee table before wiggling out of my hold until she had both knees on either side of my thighs and her core pressed against the fly of my pants.

She leaned forward but then quickly sat up straighter and looked around the living room. “Where’s Gracie?”

I chuckled. I loved that she was aware enough to care who might see her, even if I much preferred when she was so lust drunk that everything around her slipped away.

“She texted me earlier that she was spending the day exploring the town and looking for a job. She said not to expect her for dinner tonight. She has plans.”

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