The medic grinned. “Sorry, man. Just wanted to see if the wound was through and through.”
I rolled my eyes. “It is.”
He nodded his head in confirmation. “I know.”
Then he started wrapping it up and applying even more pressure, making my belly dip as pain raced its way through my system.
“Hurt?” he asked.
I rolled my eyes. “Not in the least.”Chapter 19I like to send notes to school in Linnie’s lunchbox that say ‘sorry the Cheez-Its are stale. That’s what happens when you leave the box open.’
-Theo’s secret thoughts
Theo
“I swear to God.” I looked at my coworker. “I put that on auto-draft the moment that you showed me the ropes. What is going on?”
In a funny twist of fate, my job that I’d received was also for a company that had a special place in my heart—Ampere Electric.
Well, Ampere was the parent company, anyway. The company that I actually worked for was a branch off of Ampere Electric and went by the name Amp Electric. I wasn’t sure why they didn’t just keep the Ampere name, but I chose to ignore it and not ask questions, which would bring light to the fact that I knew more than I probably should as a new employee.
“We found a glitch in the system,” she said. “There are a few individuals—which usually only affects the owners—that have to pay the system manually. There’s just something in the system that doesn’t allow them to use the auto-draft feature. Like the auto-draft refuses to be paid by a card that has the company’s name on it? I don’t know. We’ve actually been trying to figure it out ourselves for six months now. You’ll just have to pay by check or call over the phone. I’m sorry.”
I wondered if Liner had the same problem, then berated myself for thinking about him.
Thinking about Liner was a dangerous game and one that I tried really hard not to play.
But, it was a game I usually lost and was forced to participate whether I wanted to or not.
It’d been just a few short months since I’d left him, and it felt like a lifetime. A lifetime of staying awake, thinking about him at night.
Thinking about what he was doing, where he was at, who he was with.
I knew without a shadow of a doubt that he wasn’t with anyone in that aspect. He was with people that he worked with or his club.
A club that hadn’t been very happy with him after everything that had gone down with me and him.
Poor guy. He was definitely between a rock and a hard place.
“How are you liking it so far?” my coworker, Jennie, asked.
I shrugged. “I’m liking it okay. It’s definitely a place where I can see myself working for a while. My only problem at this point are the weird hours.”
She laughed. “Welcome to my life. I have to get my husband to get home before the school bus lets off otherwise my kids are all by themselves. I’m honestly surprised the owners worked so well with your hours. It was a miracle that you got them to agree to let you off at three-fifteen.”
Was it?
I’d had those hours when I started, and I had a feeling it had a lot to do with the man that had likely pulled a few strings to get me here in the first place.
Liner.
God, everything just circled back to him one way or the other, didn’t it?
I had a sneaking suspicion he was also the reason for my card not working as well. In a roundabout way, I was certain he was paying my way…
“Hey, wow. Look at that!”
I turned to see the television in the corner of the room displaying what looked like a shooting scene.
My heart started to pound as I reached for the remote at the corner of my desk and turned the volume up.
Normally we weren’t allowed to listen to it seeing as it would affect our calls if we got one, but I couldn’t stop myself from looking at the screen. Not in a million years. Not if the building was on fire around me.
“What is it?” Jennie asked worriedly.
Oh, holy shit.
I stared at first, not quite comprehending what I was seeing.
The news reporter was standing in a neighborhood. She was a pretty little thing, but she was wearing too much makeup.
Not that I was really an expert on makeup, but that girl was a beautiful girl, she likely didn’t need the tons that was slapped on her face.
But, when I finally looked behind the reporter, a little niggle started to tease the back of my brain.
Something about the place was familiar.
Why was it familiar?
Then I realized that I’d seen that house before—the one in the background.
I also realized rather quickly that the town that was splashed against the bottom of the screen in the ticker was familiar, too. The banner at the bottom of the page read, “Attempted murder in Bear Bottom, Texas of Ampere Electric Millionaire.”