Page 79 of Stealing His Cupcake
Rolling my eyes, I wait for Kayla to run out of breath, then interrupt her tirade. “I’m not in Kansas City anymore, Kay. I will explain everything later, but now I really need to talk to Ethan. I love you, but can you rein in the crazy a little?”
“I’m not crazy! Am I crazy? No, Ethan is shaking his head, so I’m definitely not crazy. Ames, you can’t just drop something like this on me and not expect me to react!”
She has a point. “Well, I was hoping to talk to Ethan alone. What are you even doing there on a workday morning? Did you spend the night, or areyou living with him now?” A clearing of her throat gives me the answer. “You are, aren’t you? What happened to never dating anyone after Nick cheated on you?”
“That’s different. And stop deflecting! I might be living with Ethan, but I’m not thinking about marrying him right now!”
“You’re not?” Ethan chuckles. “Well, I’ll have to try harder, bunny.”
Kayla shushes him and there’s some giggling and, I assume, kissing on the other side of the line. It painfully reminds me how alone I am right now, with no one to kiss or giggle with. “Cut it out, you two,” I grumble half-heartedly. I’m happy for Kayla but dammit, I have more important things to do than listen to her making out with her sexy boyfriend. “Paying customer here, waiting to be serviced.”
“Right,” Ethan replies, clearing his throat. “Sorry about that. I don’t want any payment from you, by the way. You’re Kayla’s friend, which basically makes you family, and it’s not like it will be that hard to find one wayward husband.”
“You mean soon-to-be husband,” Kayla says. “Please, tell me you haven’t married some douchebag already. No offense, sis, but you have terrible taste in men.”
She has a point there, too. “Maybe, but I’ve been married to this particular douchebag for two months already, and things were great. And… It might not be as easy to find him as you think. His occupation isn’t exactlylegal, and he’s good at staying under the radar. I bet he has a whole new identity set up already.” One in which he isn’t married to me. Asshole.
“TWO MONTHS?!” Kayla screams. “What do you mean, you’ve been married for two months? And what do you mean, not exactly legal?! Jesus Christ, Amy, what have you gotten yourself into?”
“Bunny, calm down, please,” Ethan soothes her. “I’m sure Amy will tell us everything if you just stop interrupting her. Give us a second, Amy. Let’s move downstairs.” Impatiently, I listen as they shuffle around. There’s some beeping and a door opening, then a click as Ethan sets the phone down. “Okay. Tell me everything you know about this husband of yours.”
I’m embarrassed to admit that I don’t know much. “His name is Wyatt Archer.” Reading from the divorce papers, I rattle off our address and his date and place of birth.
I hear Ethan typing on a keyboard. “Alright. And what’s this ‘not exactly legal’ occupation of his?”
Well, here it goes. “Kayla, don’t scream, okay? He’s a hitman.”
“WHAT?!”
“He kills people for money,” I specify in case Ethan didn’t hear me through my best friend’s scream. “I think he’s really good at it. Maybe even famous in those, um, circles.” Both Slava and Nolan knew of Wyatt, and Nolan even considered him some kind of weird role model, so I can safely assume Wyatt is quite popular when it comes to killing people.
“Uh-huh,” Ethan replies while Kayla continues yelling at me. “What the actual fuck, Amy? Please, tell me this is a joke.”
Frustration has me lashing out. “It’s not a fucking joke, Kayla. Wyatt is mine, and he’s going to fucking regret ever leaving me. He might have kidnapped me and forced me to marry him but he didn’t force me to fall in love with him. I did that all on my own, and now that I’ve had a taste of what love feels like, I’m not letting him go. You can freak out all you want about it, but I’m going to find Wyatt, bring him home, and we will be fucking happy!”
That shuts her up. For approximately ten seconds. “Did you just say he kidnapped you?” Oh. I did, didn’t I? “How can you talk about love when he forced you into this?”
Ethan laughs. “Hypocritical much, bunny?” Before I can ask what that remark was about, he continues, “Amy is right, by the way. Wyatt is quite famous on the dark web. It’s going to be a challenge to find him.” He doesn’t sound worried, though. More like excited. “Do you want me to take care of him?”
“Take care of him? No! Oh my god, what kind of an investigator are you? I don’t want Wyatt dead, for Christ’s sake. I just want to find him so I can kick him in the nuts and drag him home.”
Sounding a little subdued, Kayla points out, “Okay, Amy, even putting the kidnapping and contract killing aside, which is absolutely crazy, by the way—”
Ethan just laughs again. “Really?”
“Yes, really! Even that put aside, and don’t take this the wrong way, Ames, but… Should you really be chasing after someone who doesn’t want you?”
Her words hurt but once again, she has a point. That’s exactly what I’ve been doing before with Craig and all the others. They would kick me aside and I’d crawl back to them. But this situation is different. “He wants me.” Or at least I pray to all the gods that he does. “He just has this idiotic notion that he doesn’t deserve me.”
“Oh my god.” Kayla gasps. “Did he actually give you that lame line? ‘It’s not you, it’s me. You deserve better, my love’,” she intones. “Did he? What a jerk.”
“Actually, he didn’t even say goodbye to my face. He just vanished without a trace and sent a note along with the divorce papers.”
“What?!” Kayla cries out for the third time that day, though with a little lower intensity. “Are you sure you want him back, sis? He sounds like an idiot. And like he definitely deserves that ball-kicking.”
“Oh, he’s going to get it, don’t worry,” I say ruefully. I’m so angry I might just punch Wyatt first thing when I see him. Or slap him. Or stab the bastard. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. “I’m definitely gonna stab that asshole for hurting me.” Did I say that out loud? Oops.
Kayla sucks in a sharp breath. “Alright, who are you and what have you done with my friend? But seriously, Ames, are you okay? This is some heavy shit we definitely need to talk through. I mean, how did you even meet a hitman?”
