Page 116 of Not That Complicated

Liam was already standing by the doorway. I hadn’t even noticed him get up.

“The bodies,” I said, although it didn’t seem even remotely important anymore. Not compared to Adam thinking for a second that I didn’t want him. Didn’t love him. “Where did we land on...? You know what? I don’t care anymore.”

Liam’s brows rose. “You don’t care?” he said. “You?”

“Nope. Forget about it.” I bustled over to him and guided him out of the doorway into the hall.

“Forget about it? Ray, you have called me and texted me and talked my ear off about this for months now, and not once has it sunk in that I’ve told you all I can and that’s all there is. And now you’re sayingforget about it?” He was leaning back, making me work to shove him ahead of me.

I reached out and opened the front door. “Well,” I said, “consider it well and truly sunk. It is what it is, right?” I clapped him on the shoulder.

“Yes, but—”

“Don’t worry about it. We’ll see what forensics comes up with. These things take months. Sometimes years. We may never know.”

“That’s...” He drew himself up indignantly. “That’s what I keep telling you!”

I tapped my ear. “I do listen. Now, thanks for stopping by, but if you don’t mind, I have important business to attend to.”

I started to shut the door on his red and annoyed face.

“Is this Adam business?” he said suspiciously.

“It’s my business.” Yes, it was Adam business. Liam had already squeezed a love confession out of me. I’d like to tell Adam myself without Liam knowing about that, too. Or giving him a heads-up, which he totally would.

Liam held the door open with the flat of his hand. “You be good to him, okay?”

“I intend to be very good to him,” I said. “Very good. Repeatedly. And I’d like to get on that—also on him—so if you’d....there we go. Thanks, Liam.” I poked him out of the way and closed the door on his face, laughing at his expression.

He thumped the door once in farewell and I heard his footsteps retreating down the path.

Right. I blew out a breath. Time to get proactive about this whole relationship stuff.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

It didn’t take me longto decide how to do it.

I was going to be romantic as hell.

Thanks to Dad sticking me with that craft beer design job, I had the funds.

Once I’d checked the hotel website and saw the price, I amended that to Ijust abouthad the funds.

Adam was worth it.

I smiled dopily at the website and clicked the BOOK NOW button. He was worth everything. Anything.

Catching sight of my reflection in the window behind my computer, I scowled. Keep it together, Ray, I told myself, and immediately started smiling again.

Well, I was trying.

Realising that I’d kept Paulina waiting for a whole hour and a half, I called her back as soon as the payment went through. Even though she wouldn’t dump me for ducking off a call, I was a professional. I told her enough about Adam to satisfy her curiosity, we wrangled over the design brief, and once I hung up, I started to fret.

I buried myself in more work, but it was no good. I grew more and more nervous as the day dragged on.

I was a worrier by nature. If this went sideways, I didn’t know how I’d get over it.

Still, even when my nerves threatened to get the better of me, I grimly pushed on. I wrapped up work, packed an overnight bag, swung by the pharmacy, and headed over to the hotel.

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