Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 68859 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68859 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 344(@200wpm)___ 275(@250wpm)___ 230(@300wpm)
Five minutes later, when it was perfect—I inherited the need to make everything perfect from my dad who was also a taxidermist—I gently laid the skin to the side, started cleaning up, and went to find Herb.
Herb was the man that I now semi-worked for.
In actuality, I ran the day-to-day operations, and he paid me an exorbitant amount of money to keep his business running while he stayed in the back and watched reruns of Gun Smoke.
“Hey, Herb,” I said to him.
He jerked his chin, not even bothering to look up.
“Yeah?” he asked with a grunt.
“I’m headed out for the night. You need anything else?” I asked.
He waved his hand in a dismissive gesture, and I headed out to the hall where I’d seen Davis disappear into the back lot.
I barely contained a growl.
Damn, would it have killed the man to fuckin’ wait on me? It was so damn dark out there, and of course he was a damn man and wouldn’t know how fucking scary it was for a woman to go out there alone.
Usually I hitched a “walk out” with one of his bodyguard dudes. Lars or Grack were my favorites, but in a pinch, Jonk and Karrim would do. Though he also had other office personnel, I didn’t much care for them. They were too stiff and unyielding. I felt like I was asking a favor of a brick wall. Though, I’d rather talk to a brick freakin’ wall than talk to Davis so…
My thoughts faltered. Yeah. It fuckin’ probably would’ve killed him to wait.
“What the fuck?” I muttered under my breath as I pushed through the back door of the building. “Why the hell did I say yes to this?”
“Because your best friend asked you to,” came Davis’s voice. Way too freakin’ close.
I shrieked and whirled, my fist going out automatically to swing for the biggest target—his head.
He caught my fist in a ridiculously easy hold and kept turning my momentum away from him until I was facing the opposite direction of where we’d been.
I blinked at the insanely easy move on his part.
“You really need to work on your technique,” he said.
“Don’t ever sneak up on a woman, Davis,” I said stiffly, shaking off his hold on my hand. “Women get scared. And sneaking up on them in dark alleys like this one is horrible.”
“What are you talking about?” he asked.
I could practically see the roll of his eyes, even when I wasn’t facing him.
I gritted my teeth and started walking to where I knew he always parked his bike, even though I could barely see.
“There’s a trash can…” he started but stopped when I found said trash can with the little toe of my foot.
“Ow,” I groused over the din of the trash can crashing to the ground.
It was one of those metal numbers that really shouldn’t be in the middle of the damn alleyway.
“I can’t see a freakin’ thing,” I grumbled darkly. “And you may have some night vision going on, but the rest of us do not. It’s hell getting out here at night. Though I think you already know that. I sent you a certified letter about it.”
There was silence and then, “I thought you sent the certified letter because you hated me.”
I rolled my eyes.
“I do hate you. But I sent the certified letter because the stupid notes that I was tacking onto your front office door weren’t working. Oh, and you blocked my phone number, so I can’t send you any text messages,” I continued.
He snorted.
“Also, I’m talking about the fact that it’s terrifyingly dark out here. You walked out without me. None of the usual people are here to help walk me out to my car, or in this instance, to yours. And it’s scary in this back alley. You just proved, rather ridiculously easily, as a matter of fact, why women are the weaker race to men. You had me controlled and subdued in a matter of seconds. That’s every woman’s worst fear when they’re out walking around in the world alone at night,” I said through partially gritted teeth.
There was a long moment of silence and then, “I’ll get lights installed Monday.”
He pulled out his phone and turned the flashlight on, but that didn’t help my sour disposition any.
I wanted to go home.
“When you walk out into the night, what’s your first thought?” I asked.
“Going home,” he answered, wondering where I was going with my line of questioning.
“The first thing I think about when I step outside by myself is, ‘am I going to have to stab someone with my knife?’” I said. “And my second thought is, ‘will my knife even stop anyone?’”
“What?” he asked, sounding shocked.
“The third thought is, is someone going to come up on my blind side and attack me from behind?” I continued. “I always have my cell phone out. I have this app that you walk out with your finger on a button. If it comes off that button on the screen, then the app automatically calls 9-1-1 for you. I pay twenty bucks a month for it.”