Fire Inside (Chaos, #2)(42)

This, I told myself, was a relief, but even as I told myself this I didn’t believe myself.

“Okay, Hop,” I said.

“I’ll come tomorrow, take you to lunch.”

Oh dear.

I had to come up with a plan to end things. Or, more accurately, buy time to create an elaborate plan that might actually work against the onslaught of all things Hopper Kincaid.

“I can’t,” I told him. “I have a lunch appointment tomorrow.”

This, fortunately, was true.

“Wednesday,” Hop immediately replied.

Damn. I didn’t have a lunch appointment on Wednesday and I needed a lot more time to create a plan that was so elaborate it might actually work.

“I work through lunch,” I informed him. It was lame but it was all I had.

“My old lady doesn’t work through lunch. She gets food in her belly and she does it eating with her old man. See you at noon.”

This was Hop’s response right before he hung up on me.

I stared at my phone for long moments before dialing him back.

Smartly, probably knowing why I was calling, Hop didn’t answer.

Gah!

Half an hour later, I received a call from a potential, huge client. They were having some issues with the creativity of their current agency drying up and they were shopping around for fresh ideas. They were giving a number of agencies a try including my agency as well as my old agency who had half-heartedly made efforts to undercut me at the same time made overtures for us to merge, something that was not going to happen. I liked being my own boss. I liked the freedom to create without someone breathing down my neck. And anyway, my offices were way cooler than their offices.

The potential client was a heavy hitter and had a massive advertising budget. It could mean big things that didn’t only include more money but possibly more clients. This approach was good. No, fabulous.

I wanted that action.

That was the good news. The bad news was, they wanted a pitch on Thursday which was nigh on impossible with the current workload even if I had come to work ahead of the game.

This meant that by Tuesday afternoon, when Hop called again, I’d worked until ten the night before and had my mind on our pitch, not on my plan to end things with Hop.

“How you doin’, lady?” he asked when I answered.

“Crazed, Hop. We have a potential new client and to build the pitch, keep up with other stuff and be able to take off Friday afternoon to meet my folks, I can’t do lunch tomorrow.” After I delivered this, I lowered my voice to finish, “I’m sorry.” And I did it actually being sorry.

Even though I didn’t want to, I had to admit, I missed my fix.

“That’s cool. I’ll bring sandwiches to your office.”

I stared at my desk blotter.

Why did I think I might get away with a valid excuse?

“Hop, seriously. It’s nuts around here.”

“Lanie, seriously, with your work, my kids and your parents here this weekend, my time seein’ you is curtailed in a way I don’t like a whole f*ckin’ lot so I’ll bring sandwiches, you work, I’ll see you and it’ll all be good.”

“You’re distracting,” I snapped and this was met with silence. When that lengthened, I called, “Hop?”

“Nicest thing you’ve said to me,” he answered, a smile in his voice I felt in the region of my heart. “When I’m not f*ckin’ you, that is,” he amended. “And outside you askin’ me if I wanted to f*ck you and all the shit you said with that the first time you asked me to f*ck you,” he went on.

I rolled my eyes to the ceiling.

“Right. Leavin’ you to get back to work after you tell me what kind of sandwich you like,” he stated.

I rolled my eyes to my computer. “This conversation could go on for four hours and you’d still be here with sandwiches at noon tomorrow, wouldn’t you?”

“Yep,” he replied, another smile in his voice.

Ty-Ty was not wrong. These boys rolled right on through even if you didn’t want them to. How I found this both irritating and attractive, I had no idea. I didn’t process that, either, except the irritating part.

“You do realize that’s kind of a jerky thing to do when you know I don’t have time to fight with you,” I pointed out.

“Yep,” he replied, still with a smile in his voice, which also meant no remorse.

“You don’t care, do you?” I asked to confirm his lack of remorse.

“Means I have lunch with you, look in your eyes, hear your voice, check you’re okay.” He paused then, “Nope.”

I sighed, liking that he wanted to look in my eyes, hear my voice, check I was okay.

God.

There it was. The reason I found his macho stubborn streak attractive.

“I like pastrami,” I told him.

“Got it,” he replied.

“And turkey. Or roast beef but only if it’s rare and only with swiss on it. Provolone if it’s pastrami. I also like Reubens but you need to tell them to go light on the sauerkraut if you take that route. I don’t like meatballs or anything that could be messy and get on my clothes, except for a Reuben, that is. No onions. My staff would be forced to smell them all day and that’s not nice. Chips, plain, nothing that could stain my fingers—like cheese puffs—or flamin’ hot. And a cookie or brownie wouldn’t go amiss.”