Page 63 of Summoning my Grumpy Demon Boss

He sighs. “Yeah. I’m fine.” His skin is blue green and a drip of water runs down his nose to splat on the counter in front of him.

“Hey.” I wind my arms around his waist and press my cheek to his back. I love the way coils of his tentacles slip around my calves and slide up my legs even though he doesn’t lift his head. “There’s something up isn’t there? You don’t seem OK.”

He pats my hand. “Come on, Mia. You’re tired. You have to work tomorrow. Let’s get some sleep.”

“Uh uh. No way. Now do I have to kiss it out of you? Or tickle it out of you?” I run my hands up his firm abs and into his armpits and he squirms.

“Really, Mia! I didn’t want to worry you.” The effect of his words is somewhat spoiled because he’s laughing and squirming under my questing hands. This is fun!

“You know what worries me?” I stick my finger into his belly button and he yelps. “When there’s something wrong with my mate and he won’t let me help.”

“Mia...” He catches my hands in his and stills them. What he says has the laughter dying on my lips. “It’s your dad.”

“Huh?” I blink at his reflection in the mirror. He’s gone very still. So have I.

“Your dad got my number. He sent me a message to meet him. That’s where I went. I should have told you, but I thought it could wait until morning.”

I frown. “What did he do that for?”

Luke sighs again. “To warn me. Threaten me, really. He says has a case against my parents and he told me he could make it go away, but only if I stopped seeing you.”

“He what?!” I hold my hand to my mouth, unable to breathe for a moment. I never thought my father would do something like this. “He said that?”

“He told me not to tell you if I wanted him to help my parents.”

I scowl. This clearly has nothing to do with an offer of help. “Oh, my God, Luke, I’m so sorry.”

“Baby, it’s not your fault. I would never think that.”

“But if you’d never gotten involved with me, this never would have happened. I don’t know how, but somehow Dad’s gone looking for this case. This can’t just be a coincidence.”

He pins me with a serious expression. “Mia, I would never give up what we’ve shared—what I still want to share with you. Not for anything. My parents haven’t done anything wrong. We’ll just... we’ll prove it. You’ll see.”

I nod. “Of course. But I know my Dad. He’s ruthless. I just never thought he’d be this unethical. There’s got to be something behind this. I’m not saying he’s right, but there has to be a case, or he wouldn’t risk coming to you with it. At least, I don’t think so.”

Luke frowns. “But I can’t think of anything.”

Then I remember what my Mum said.He’s just your summer mistake. But it’s winter. She wasn’t talking about now.She must have been talking about ten years ago. Only they never knew. Did they?

I am horrified by the thought that they’ve harboured some grudge all these years. I have to admit I thought it was odd that they packed us up and had us back in Sydney days before we were due to leave town. And then they suggested I go overseas and funded the trip...

“If only we knew what she claims happened,” Luke says, breaking into my awful train of thoughts.

An idea occurs to me and as soon as it does, I know I won’t be able to let it go. I have the keys to the office and the security code. My father is just old school enough he keeps paper files on all his cases. “We can check his records.”

“How?”

“I’ll go in tonight. There won’t be anyone there this time of night. We’ll go and look through his files. At least then we’ll know if there’s anything substantial to his threats.”

Luke gives me a grim smile. “You’d do that for my family?”

“Of course.” I release him and step back. “Let me get dressed and we’ll go right now.”

***

What I find the second I pull the file from the drawer in my dad’s office makes the nausea rise like bile in my throat. “A woman called Margaret Nguyen.” I keep scanning, pushing the papers around on the wooden surface of my father’s desk. “Seems like a workplace injury that’s developed into a chronic condition. She’s suing for negligence.”

Luke’s eyes widen. “Margaret? She only worked at Inlet Views for a few months.” His frown deepens. “Then she left suddenly.”

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