AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Asher tipped his head and eyed me.
“What? I told you I was giving Atlee time and taking some for myself. I know I’m quick to throw out advice and quicker to turn it away when it’s offered to me. Introspection sucks, my friend. It forces you to come to terms with all your flaws, not just the ones you want to get rid of.”
The room fell silent again.
I’d known these men for a long time. They were my brothers. Their silence spoke volumes as to how closed off I’d been.
The reminder didn’t feel good. The old me would’ve used that to reinforce my notion I was a failure. Atlee’s Wilson was taking it as an opportunity to do better.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Mia said from the conference room door. “Wilson, you have a call. Jasmin Parker.”
“Thanks, Mia. I’ll take it in my office.”
A few moments later I picked up the phone and answered.
“Jasmin, how are you?”
“I’ve been better.”
That was a loaded statement coming from Jasmin Parker. It could mean anything from one of Z Corps teams was neck-deep trying to prevent a hostile takeover of a small country to fighting warlords in South Sudan, or that her twin boys were up to shenanigans.
“You asked me to call if I met with Catarina Keys,” she went on.
Catarina had taken off the night of the auction rescue. She wasn’t answering my calls and she’d ghosted Jack. I knew from Joan the next morning Cat had quit SOIB, effective immediately. But since then it’d been radio silence.
“How is she?”
“She’s fine. What she’s not is an employee of Z Corps. She turned down my offer.”
Fuck.
I was hoping she’d join Jasmin’s team. Word was Zane Lewis treated his teams like family. Catarina needed that after the shit she’d been through.
“Did she tell you why?”
Jasmin didn’t answer right away. Instead, she blew out a breath. When she spoke again her tone was soft.
“She’s not ready.”
“What’s that mean?”
“She said she had unfinished business she needed to see to.”
That didn’t sound good.
“What aren’t you telling me, Jasmin?”
“A lot,” she admitted. “I get you care about her or you wouldn’t have asked me to check on her. So I’ll give you this to put your mind at ease. She’s strong, and a pissant like Martin Jackson doesn’t have it in him to break her. I want her on my team. She’s smart, her instincts are spot on, I can give her the freedom she needs to utilize her skills. She knows that but still she turned me down. She’s got other ideas for her future and moving to Maryland isn’t in the plan for her. The best I could get from her is she’d contract with us on jobs.”
That didn’t tell me shit.
“She beat the fuck out of Martin. And the way she did it says something different than you implied.”
“Yeah, I bet she did,” Jasmin said. “I can’t think of a woman who would enjoy sitting on a man’s lap while he was sporting an erection she had no desire to feel. But that’s as far as he got with her.”
Thank fuck.
“I appreciate you making the time to call me.”
