Page 39 of Plunge

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Fletcher

THISTLE DRIVES ME the whole way to Philadelphia, all huffy and sexy. Her dress shifts up her thighs as she changes gears and I don’t even pretend I’m not noticing. I sit in her sexy car and think of all the ways I’d like to mess it up with her. That night at the hotel was definitely not closure.

And that afternoon in the parking lot was definitely also not closure…

Shit. I can’t let myself think that way.

“How’s your mom,” I ask, trying to change the subject.

“Mom is doing great,” she says. “She graduated from therapy yesterday. Well, home-based therapy.”

“That’s awesome, right?” I raise a brow at her. “You going back to New York then?”

“I mean, I sort of committed to helping Archer.” She shrugs. “I have no idea what I want to do, if I’m honest.”

“Don’t you have a highly specific set of marketable skills for international business?”

She bites her lip, considering. “I do have specific skills,” she says. “But basically the thing I’m best at is making money, and I don’t know if that’s enough for me anymore.” Thistle explains that sometimes, while she was helping her mother change clothes or something similar, she would wonder who she would call on to do these things for her if she had an accident.

“I mean, I’d be paying a stranger to do it, Fletcher. What do I have other than a condo and a cool car?”

“Well, for one thing, you’ve got a dead sexy husband who can’t keep it in his pants.”

She smacks my leg and asks me for directions to Khalil’s office.

I stare at her while she parallel parks, and it takes everything I have not to stroke my dick while she backs into a spot on the left side of the street. This woman is good at driving, knows about fast cars, and agreed to marry me as a favor. “Fuck,” I mutter, and hop out of the car.

I gesture for her to go up the stairs first when we reach his building, and I enjoy, again, that round ass that’s only gotten better with age. I remember all the running workouts we used to do together and how all those lunges and stair climbing really perked up Thistle’s butt.

And then I remember how my obsession with her butt got us into so much trouble the first time around, and I sober up real quick.

I open the door for her and we walk into Khalil’s office, where he starts pumping her hand enthusiastically. “Is this her?” He keeps asking. “Is this the Mrs. Crawford I suggested you find? This is wonderful. Just wonderful.”

Thistle squints at me and I shrug. We sit and Khalil promises he’s been in touch with Anya’s staff. “I made the entire thing seem like we ran into each other by coincidence,” Khalil says. “Oh, did I tell you I ran into our mutual acquaintance? He was in the city with his wife. This is what I said. And it worked!”

“So I’m clear?”

Khalil shakes his head. “Not quite yet. But the seed is planted, sir. Let me water it a few more days.”

Khalil snaps a picture of us with his phone and smiles. “Just to have,” he says. He leans back in his chair and grins. “There is chemistry here,” he says. “Just like I suggested.”

I shift uncomfortably in my seat, pay Khalil, and ask an angry Thistle if she’ll have lunch with me.

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