She grinned and rolled her eyes. “Well, you were going to say thank you, silly.” She narrowed her gaze at me suddenly. “And you weren’t going to say another fucking thing aside from ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, Shelly.’”
“That’s not what I was going to say.” I bit back a groan.
She shrugged again. “Close enough.”
Jesus. I knew she was different, but damn…
“You can say thank you now,” she prompted.
I looked around. “Where did you put all my paperwork?”
“I filed it.” She pulled open a file cabinet I’d never used and pointed inside. “Old cases, cold cases, invoices, receipts.” She swiped her finger around, pointing out the other files. Then she dusted her hands together. “I can work on your invoicing system next. It needs some serious work.”
“Shelly.” I heaved her name out on a sigh. “I’m not hiring you to work in my office.”
“I know. I’m doing it for free.”
Fuck me. “Why would you want to work for free?”
She rolled her eyes at me again. “I have a trust fund that would allow me to buy whatever I want. But it won’t let me buy myself a job. And I kind of told Lynn that I would try to be respectable, now that I’m an aunt and all.”
She looked so serious that I almost bit back my laugh. Almost but not quite. I coughed out a sputter.
“What’s so funny?” she asked, her brow furrowing.
“You want to work for me? For free? So you can be respectable?” I barked out another laugh. While I
chuckled, I tucked my Glock back into its holster.
“Is that so hilarious?” The vee between her eyes grew deeper.
Yes. Yes, it was. “No,” I said. “I just don’t need office help.”
Her features softened. “Tell that to someone who didn’t just reorganize your filing system.”
I raised my hand to run it through my hair, but my side hurt like hell, so I brought my arm back down.
“Why did you just wince?” she asked, her eyes sweeping up and down me like she had X-ray vision.
“I didn’t,” I muttered. I did. I hurt like hell, but there was no reason for her to know that.
“Yes, you did.” She reached for my arm, her slender fingers sliding across the tender skin on my wrist.
“It’s nothing,” I said. “I fell.”
“Did you break something?”
“No.”
Her fingertips tickled up my side until she poked a spot that made me wince. “You might have broken a rib.”
“I don’t think so.” I’d done that enough times that I’d know. She continued to poke around until I grabbed her fingers. “Please stop poking me where it hurts.”
“Oh,” she chirped. She winced. “Sorry.”
She didn’t pull her fingers from mine, and our stare-off turned quickly into an uncomfortable moment. I cleared my throat as soon as I realized it and she jerked her hand back.
“You should go,” I said. And don’t come back. I was going to kill Mason for suggesting she come and work for me. “Why don’t you just ask Mason for a job at the hospital?” Mason and both his parents worked there. It should be easy.