Bait (Wake, #1)(38)

I didn't care though. I'd been honest with her and now she was getting on my nerves. She was acting pathetically, which was the biggest turn off of all.

I opened the door behind her and stood there, waiting for her to take the hint and go. She loomed there for a second, let out a little laugh and turned to me. Her hair swinging around to her shoulder. She had a totally different look in her eyes. She looked angry.

She came forward, leaving like I'd requested. She stopped in front of me and whispered, “I'd let you call me Honeybee.”

My balls hit the floor. Honeybee. What did she know about Blake? My mind raced, and my adrenaline spiked. Maybe I heard her wrong. My mind was playing tricks on me.

“What did you say?”

“Honeybee. That's what you call your friends, right? You can call me that, too.”

“You don't know what you're talking about.” I made sure not to grab her arm too hard, even though I wanted to squeeze the shit out of it. I guided her out of the room. I didn't even let my fingers wrap around it. I only let my palm push her through the doorway.

As soon as she was past the frame, I shut the door. She still had my key. I'd need to call the desk in the morning and get another one. But first, I needed to figure out how in the f*ck Aly knew about Blake.

She saw her at the party, but I don't think I even mentioned her. I doubt that Micah or Cory said anything to her that night. Besides, that was weeks ago. Why would she choose then to bring it up?

And I never called Blake honeybee to anyone else. It was only in my phone.

My phone.

Aly went through my phone.

Aly switched my room keys.

Maybe she wasn't the pushover I thought she was. She certainly didn't act that way that night. I'd needed to talk to her. That kind of shit was crazy. She was nuts.

She saw what we'd written to each other.

I read through the messages from earlier that day. There wasn't anything to worry about, except for toward the end, it wasn't even that flirty.

I fell asleep that night with an uneasy feeling. Blake hadn't called. On one hand, I hoped Aly had something to do with it, because on the other hand was a possibility it had something to do with Grant. She could still be with him.

I hated that hand most of all.

Thursday, July 3rd, 2008

I killed it at my meetings. Brewster's loved the beer that we'd sent them and was pretty much ready to place orders and get a regular delivery scheduled, as soon as possible. They committed to stocking Bay at their top three locations to see how it went over. Saying that if all went well, they'd be happy to make it a house brew at each of their many establishments. We finished early and had a long lunch at their flagship location downtown.

Bruce and Tom were cool guys. They would be fun clients.

It worked out well. We closed up everything that I'd wanted to accomplish in a day and a half in the sum of a few hours. There would be no dinner.

By the time I'd returned to the hotel, I'd already changed our plane tickets. We were leaving this afternoon. I just needed to let her know. It was probably passive aggressive, but I called Marc anyway.

I'd let him tell her that we were coming back early. I dialed him the minute I got back to my room, and into it with my third room key in two days.

“Hey, Case. How's Chicago?” He laughed over the line. “Did she tank another one?” He continued to chuckle. To this man a spade was a spade. I'd informed him about our Austin meeting and I was sure he'd spoken to Aly, so there wasn't any point in sugarcoating it. We both knew she probably wasn't cut out for sales.

“No. She didn't go this morning, and we actually wrapped up everything. They gave a verbal go ahead and I'll have the office send over the paperwork for their billing when I get back.” The meeting went great, and the deal was well worth the trip, but at that point there was no need for another night in Chicago.

I didn't want to spend another night there like the previous one. I could use a long weekend.

“That's my boy. You're doing great out there. I'm glad we bought the building across the street and went ahead with ordering the new machinery. All these new orders already have us working at maximum capacity. I never thought I'd say that, kid. Hell, I might even get to retire,” he added with a laugh.

“Yeah, you will. Hey, I changed our flights to head home today. Since the deal is already wrapped up, there really isn't a good reason to stick around here.”

“Yeah, that sounds great. You gonna come in or are you taking tomorrow off?”

“I think I'm going to take it off. I've got a big week coming up. Is that okay?”

“No problem. Aly coming back, too?”

“I changed her ticket, but…” I didn't know how to say this, other than to just lay it out there, “I think you should call her and tell her.”

He sounded concerned when he said, “Everything all right?” I didn't want him to worry. Everything was all right. She probably felt pretty dumb about it. I still needed to talk to her about my phone, but I'd have plenty of time on the plane. That conversation wasn't going to be the easiest, so I was thankful we’d be parting ways for a few days afterward.

“It's all good. Aly and I had a disagreement last night. I'd rather you call, if that's okay.” If he called, she wouldn't be able to argue. She switched my key without feeling too bad about it, I supposed I could change our flights and she'd just have to deal with it. Fair was fair.