Page 78 of Forced Proximity
She snickered.
“I haven’t played Solitaire in a long time,” she admitted.
“Well,” I backed out of the program. “You have it back. Plus, now it runs faster, and you don’t have to worry about what you’re browsing on. I took it off of the hospital’s servers.”
“Huh,” she said. “Why?”
“Because I also think it’s bullshit when employers watch your every move.” I stood up. “Come to my place when you get off?”
“The dogs…”
“Are with Webber and Silver,” I interjected before she could ask much more. “They’re great dogs. Silver was always trying to steal them from Knight and Elaine.”
I rubbed at my chest when the pain shot through my heart at the mention of my friends’ names.
It would never get easier, either.
I knew because Tavi’s name being mentioned still had the power to make my knees weak, and it’d been a while since he’d been gone.
“What? No! You can’t get rid of their dogs!” she cried out, leaning forward in her seat and placing her hand on my thigh. “They’re already lost, Finnian. They don’t need that added to their grief!”
I caught her hand and folded it in between both of mine. “Baby, listen to me.”
She stubbornly kept talking, trying to convince me of something that I wouldn’t give on.
“They don’t know their entire lives has changed…”
“They’re good dogs,” I spoke over her. “But Silver loves them. I like them. Do you think that they’d be better off with someone that likes them, or loves them?”
She refused to answer.
I winked at her and pulled her closer by her chair. “I already cleaned my house from top to bottom and ordered an air purifier. There’s no hint of them even being in my house now.” I leaned closer. “Now, will you come to my place once you’re done here?”
“Do I have a choice?” she asked.
I pressed my lips to hers, giving her a brief kiss before standing. “Actually, no. You don’t have a choice. See you when you get off work.” I paused. “I will install an app on your phone that’ll let you into the gate and the house. If I’m still in bed, just crawl into it with me.”
She frowned. “How will you…”
I raised a brow at her.
“Never mind.” Her lips twitched. “Hacker. I remember.”
I winked at her and left, smiling for the first time in hours.
Too bad the feeling didn’t stay.
Fifteen
Oh, look. Nobody gives a shit.
—Apollo to Webber
APOLLO
I was woken up by not one, not two, but three nightmares since I went to bed four hours ago, and I was utterly exhausted.
Just when I got into deep sleep again, another one would come creeping in, and I’d wake with a racing heart and the deep, dark sense of loneliness that only the loss of the ones you loved the most could cause.
