Page 135 of Loss Aversion

So, despite worrying about her daily calorie consumption, or if she had gotten enough sleep or taken her vitamins and drunk her protein shakes, he walked away. Drove away, more accurately. Letting her go to the man who provided her a police cruiser upon request, a set of fur-covered handcuffs, blew up an eighty-foot yacht as a small distraction, and barreled into the front door in full SWAT gear, without a second thought.

That wasn’t him.

Never would be.

Delaying his trek back to a lonely apartment for long enough, he said his goodbyes, kissed Mia on the forehead, and gave Angus a threatening glare, which was about Bernadette. The elderly ginger man glared back, undaunted. Despite being relegated to a wheelchair.

And Grant resignedly drove home.

He opened the door to his apartment and almost turned around and left again upon seeing his weekly maid service had yet to finish cleaning.

Hold up. This woman wasn’t Joyce, but someone else.

“Joyce okay?” he asked, throwing his keys on the dining table. He hated when she sent someone else to clean. One, because they didn’t do as good of a job. And two, because he didn’t like change. Liked things to stay the same. Status quo. Boring shit.

The woman didn’t pause her cleaning. “Joyce caught a cold from her daughter. Told her I’d help her out,” she said while loading coffee cups into the dishwasher and wiping down the kitchen countertops.

“Bedroom done?” he asked, trudging toward the back, eager to get into the shower.

“Yep. You’re good,” she responded.

He closed the door behind him, turned on the shower, and removed his jeans and Henley shirt and threw them in the corner on the floor. Stepping into the steamy spray, he leaned into it and lowered his head, letting the water sluice over his head and down his back. Washing away the never-ending thoughts of a small, curvy brunette and the squeals of joy he could elicit from a simple bag of Spicy Doritos or an order of fully loaded nachos.

He rubbed at his chest, plagued with a near constant ache. Maybe he needed to get checked? There could be a history of atherosclerosis in his family and he wouldn’t even know. Because he didn’t have one. One that he knew, anyway.

Jesus, he hated being such a boring, status quo, pansy-ass.

Lifting his head, he reached for the bar of soap and flinched at the sight of the maid, staring at him from the other side of the shower glass.

What the fuck?

Where was his weapon?

The woman slowly opened the sliding door, and something he couldn’t explain kept him from pulling her into a headlock or chokehold.

There was something vaguely familiar about her.

Before he could consider that, the maid raised both hands to just below her neck and, to his shock, began to pull the skin over her chin. And then, her nose and over her eyes and forehead.

Tati.

“You left me,” she said, dropping her fake face to the tile floor, a note of vulnerability in her voice, along with a piece of lingering latex dotting her forehead.

He turned off the shower, not taking his eyes off her. Tati was here. In his bathroom.

“You were busy. With Morales. Figured that’s where you belonged.”

A blue vein along the side of her neck was pulsating. She was royally pissed.

“You’re an asshole,” she choked.

“You didn’t have to come all the way to Wayward wearing a disguise to tell me that. Could’ve just made a phone call.” Fuck. Real smooth, dumb-ass.

To his surprise and self-loathing, tears fell down each of her cheeks.

Fuck.

He was an asshole.

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