I'll Say Anything

by Danielle Bourdon

“What if they say no?”

  “I'll go to another bank.”

  “What if I say please?” I searched his eyes. Jasper didn't appear moved by my plea.

  “I don't know when I'll be back. You going in to work today?” Jasper asked.

  Before my visit to Ramsey, I'd been on the schedule for the night. I figured I still was, since I hadn't quit after all. “Yeah, I go in a little later.”

  “I'll see you later tonight then, all right?” He leaned down, pausing with his lips a hairsbreadth from my own. As if asking whether he could or could not kiss me.

  I kissed him, a brief but warm press of lips. “See you later, then.”

  Jasper smiled, tweaked a piece of my hair, then continued toward the Camaro. He winked over the hood, got in, and drove off several minutes later.

  Ambivalent about many things, not the least being what would happen between Jasper and me, I headed inside to finish my breakfast.

  One thing was for sure: Jasper had no intention of using Ramsey's money, but I did.

  *

  At nine-fifteen, when I'd reached the end of my shift, I changed back into street clothes and left the employee quarters. I walked the halls until I found my shift supervisor, a young man with short blonde hair and austere features that matched his austere personality. He was all business, all the time. I always thought it was strange to address someone my own age with an honorific.

  “Mister Hanson, can you contact Mister Cassano and tell him I need a word with him, please? It's important.” After a moment, I added, “Adrian, not Ramsey.”

  Mister Darren Hanson glanced up from a clipboard, brows arching high. “If there's a problem with your schedule, or a conflict of some kind, you bring that to me--”

  “It's not. Will you call him, please?” I refused to tell my supervisor what the problem was, or that it was of an intensely personal nature.

  Darren fished his phone from his pocket and made a call. I only heard one side of the conversation of course, but I had no trouble figuring out Adrian's answers.

  “Sir? This is Hanson. Yeah, I've got an employee here who says she needs to—it's Finley Carson, Sir. Yes Sir. I don't know, she wouldn't say. But she said she needs to see you, and that it's important. Yes Sir.” Darren ended the call and said, “He'll meet you in the second staff room in ten minutes.”

  “Thanks.” I didn't give Mister Hanson any time to question me further. Bypassing him while he pocketed his phone, I made tracks for the staff room. It was around the corner, halfway down the hall. On the way, I practiced what I needed to say.

  The staff room, which I'd seen several times before, boasted intricate crown molding, a large oval table of smoked glass, and white leather chairs with a stylized O embroidered into the head rest. I chose to pace the room while I waited, dragging my fingers along the fake leaves of a potted palm.

  Several minutes later, less than the ten I'd expected, Adrian entered without bothering to knock. He'd shed a suit jacket and wore only ash gray slacks and a snowy shirt with several buttons at the throat undone. His tie was nowhere to be seen. Brushed back, Adrian's hair curled here and there, barely contained with product.

  “What's so important?” Adrian said, wasting no time on pleasantries. He pocketed his hands and fished through coins and keys, making the items jangle and clink.

  “I need you to tell me how to find Parker Brooks.” He cut to the chase and I followed his cue. There wasn't exactly a truce between Adrian and I, but at least he hadn't badgered and heckled me lately.

  Adrian's droll attitude shifted. He straightened his posture and frowned. “Why do you want to know how to find Parker Brooks? He's no one you want to mess with, Finley.”

  “Can you help me or not?” I asked Adrian, blunt and to the point.

  “I know a few places you can look, but I'm not going to tell you where they are.”

  “Why not?” I propped a hand on my hip, frustrated that the men I knew were blocking me at every turn.

  “I just told you. Besides that, if anything happened to you, Ramsey would beat me black and blue.”

  I actually laughed. “I don't believe that for a second. You're the one who likes to fight, not Ramsey.”

  “Trust me. When he wants to, he can throw down with the best of them. I won't tell you where to find Parker, but I'll pass on a message.” Adrian gave me a look that clearly said, take it or leave it.

  “I need you to pass on more than a message.” Withdrawing Ramsey's now signed check, I stepped over to Adrian and offered it out. I didn't especially care that I was forfeiting the extra money; I cared that the threat against Jasper ceased to exist. I cared that we got the monkey off our collective backs.

  Adrian took the check and glanced at it. Then he laughed. “Well, isn't that telling. My cousin must really have it bad for you. I'm not sure I understand what he sees, but that's his problem, not mine.”

  Ignoring the bait, I said, “Can you get that to Parker Brooks for me or not, Adrian?”

  “He doesn't deal in paper. Not this kind of paper. But I'll tell you what, I'll take care of this. All right? I'll see Parker paid off. Did Ramsey add any extra on here?”

  I almost said no. “Two thousand.”

  “All right. I'll put the overage in an envelope with your paycheck. How's that?” Adrian pocketed the check after folding it over.

  “That's perfect. I appreciate your help, Adrian.” The man infuriated me no end, but the less danger I put myself in, the less arguing I would hear from Jasper. He wasn't going to be happy anyway that I'd paid Parker off with Ramsey's money.

  “Anything for my cousin's object of affection.” Adrian turned to the door.

  “I'm not that to him anymore. We're just friends,” I said, feeling like I had to point it out.

  Adrian glanced over his shoulder, an almost sympathetic look on his face. “You keep telling yourself that. This is the most smitten I've seen him with anyone in a long time.”

  Before I could explain, Adrian closed the door, ending the conversation. There wasn't anything I could do about Adrian's misconception. Ramsey had known before me that I wanted someone else. I still experienced a pang of guilt knowing Ramsey had liked me enough for Adrian to notice, enough to write out a check in the thousands to help the man who was essentially his competition.

  Arriving home an hour later, I stepped into the apartment, immediately looking for Jasper. His Camaro was outside, indicating he'd gotten home before me. Draped on the loveseat, tie askew and shirt half untucked from his pants, Jasper held a bottle of whiskey in one hand, the other arched back behind his head. The scent of liquor permeated the small space.

  Right away I knew things hadn't gone well at the bank. At any of the banks. The drinking annoyed me regardless. Walking to the loveseat, I snatched the bottle out of Jasper's hand, took it to the sink, and upended the contents down the drain.

  “Hey—hey! Finley!” Jasper missed when he reached for my arm, and was too late stumbling to the sink in an attempt to stop me pouring the whiskey away.

  “You know how much I hate it,” I said, tossing the empty bottle in the trash. Facing a looming, scowling Jasper, I tilted my chin up, unafraid and not backing down. A glass or two was one thing—three quarters of the bottle was another.

  “That was my whiskey,” he said, nostrils flaring. Bracing a hand against the counter on each side of my hips, effectively trapping me, Jasper added, “I know you don't like it, but tonight, I don't care.”

  “Well, I do. And you're going to go straight to bed, because I don't want to deal with you all drunk and stumbling around and slurring your words.”

  “I'm not slurring.”

  And he wasn't. Yet. “I don't care. Go to bed and sleep it off, Jasper. I mean it.”

  “No.”

  “Go ahead. Get belligerent with me. I'll pepper spray your drunk self.”

  He barked a laugh filled with little humor. “You would, too, wouldn't you? Yeah, I bet so. And enjoy every second of it, sadist th
at you are.”

  “That just proves you've had too much to drink. You're the sadist of the group, not me.”

  “Lies.”

  I pushed against his chest. It would have been nicer to press against him, to lay my mouth over his pulse and suckle the skin until he moaned. Not tonight. Not like this. “Who was the one who fed me an undercooked cupcake? That would be you. And I know you enjoyed watching me gum it to death, which makes you the sadist in this house.”

  Jasper smirked, a half-cocked expression that faded a moment later. “I didn't get the loan, Fins,” he said with sober seriousness.

  “I know, Jasper.”

  “Got turned down by three places.”

  “I figured.”

  “Don't know what I'm gonna do 'bout Brooks.” He tilted his head down until our foreheads touched.

  “I took care of it.” Maybe the liquor would dull his reaction.

  He stiffened and raised his head. His eyes narrowed to slits. “You did what?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Licking my lips, holding Jasper's gaze, I said, “I took care of it.”

  “I'm not sure what you mean by that, but I already know I'm not gonna like it. What did you do, Finley?”

  “I had someone pay Parker off. I didn't go find him myself or anything, but it's taken care of.” I rested my hands on his hips, hips that had so blissfully moved against mine not that many hours ago. Strange, I thought, how sharp my interest was about his body, when I hadn't given it any attention before.

  Jasper pulled back. He twisted out of my grip and paced through the small kitchenette, a little unsteady on his feet.

  “I told you I didn't want to use Ramsey's money. What, did Ram the Man save the day again? Huh? He's got an in somehow, got connections, and came to the rescue?”

  This was what I didn't like about alcohol, and the sometimes-effect it had on certain people. Jasper's raw mood wasn't all due to liquor, but at least three-fourths of the nastiness spewing from his mouth right now was. Steeling my resolve, my patience, I said, “I used the money, yes, but Ramsey didn't take care of it. Adrian did.”

  The countdown to detonation was on. Five, four, three...

  “You went to Adrian, the same Adrian who was harassing you in the parking lot? The same one I fought with?”

  If I had been a cat, my ears would have laid flat back. While Jasper hadn't shouted, his tone was far from complimentary. Counting to five, I inhaled and exhaled before attempting a reply.

  “Yes, I went to Adrian, since he was the one who initially identified who had probably left the body in the alley. I figured he'd know where to find him. When he offered to deal with Parker, sparing me, I accepted.” After a small hesitation, I added, “I don't know why you can't just be relieved that it's over.”

  Jasper flailed a hand. “You don't know why—Finley, how well do you think I like everyone knowing my personal business?”

  “How well do you think I'd handle it if you were dead?” I countered.

  Jasper shot me an impatient look, as if he thought I'd cheated using that tactic. “I would have figured something out.”

  “We're out of time, Jasper. I took the shortest route away from danger that I could. Let's just focus on what we're going to do from here, instead of hashing over what has been.”

  “It's not that easy, Finley. I told you I didn't want to use that money--”

  “Honestly, Jasper? I did. I'm the one who almost fell apart the night I had to go to the morgue, thinking I was going to identify your body. I'm not willing to do that again. What would you have done if it had been me, huh? You're going to stand there and tell me you'd think it was fun to keep running back to the morgue, never knowing if you were going to have to identify me by the scars we both have on our knees?” I remained calm but reasonable, never allowing my voice to become strident or angry. It was a struggle.

  “Of course I wouldn't like it. But you didn't give me any time, Finley.”

  “I gave us all the time I thought we had. Now it's over.”

  Jasper raked a hand back through the loose locks falling across his forehead, still glaring at me. He said, “It might be over for you, but it's not over for me.”

  “Jasper--” I wanted us to go back to the intensity of the night before, where he stared into my eyes with something closer to affection than the dismay I saw there now.

  He swayed past me, shrugging off my touch when I tried to prevent him from leaving.

  “I swear, Jasper, I will tackle you if you even think of getting behind the wheel right now.”

  At the door, Jasper frowned over his shoulder. “I might be a little drunk, Finley, but I'm not stupid. When have you ever known me to drink anything and drive?”

  I lifted my chin, unrepentant. “Never, but that doesn't mean there won't be a first time. You're mad, and I can't do anything about it, and maybe not thinking straight. I'm just saying—don't even try to get in the car.”

  He snorted at me and slammed the door in his wake.

  “Well that went splendidly,” I said, voice full of sarcasm, as Jasper walked out. Ignoring the urge to go after him and make him listen to reason, I went over and flopped onto the loveseat instead. Tipping my head back, I rubbed my eyes and tried not to think about where Jasper was going—or who he was going to see. Images of him and Cecilia floated through my mind, threatening to overwhelm my control. And what could I say if he did come home with her lipstick on his mouth and her perfume on his skin? Jasper knew better than anyone what I thought of 'romance' and relationships and monogamy in general. He'd listened to me gripe about men I'd dated time and again, lamenting about my unwillingness to commit or to engage in a relationship that involved anything serious. For Jasper, falling into the arms of another woman after being with me last night wouldn't be any big deal. He might even think I'd prefer it—and didn't I? Why should Jasper be any different than any other man?

  But he was. I wanted more of his touches, more of the looks, just...more. There was a wealth of undiscovered Jasper to learn. I knew all there was to know about his regular life. His quirks, his habits, favorite foods and how he'd gotten every scar on his body. I knew he wasn't adverse to relationships—he'd been in a few over the years, none lasting longer than six or seven months.

  As the hours dragged on, and Jasper didn't come home, a sinking feeling settled in the pit of my stomach. It upset me more than I wanted to admit, thinking that he was currently tangled up with Cecilia, finding refuge in another woman's arms. Another woman's bed.

  When the slinking fingers of dawn crept past the edges of the curtains, I hauled myself up off the couch and wandered into the bedroom. This forlorn, down-in-the-dumps feeling wasn't me. I wasn't familiar with heartache—or heartbreak. And I didn't like it. Falling into bed fully clothed, I rolled onto my side, desperate to fall asleep so the awful sensation would go away.

  At least for a little while.

  *

  A gust of warm breath on my neck roused me from slumber. Opening my eyes, unable to roll over or sit up thanks to a body pressing against my side, pressing me into the mattress, I cut a look back and up, meeting Jasper's inquisitive gaze. Memories flooded in from the long night awake, waiting for him to come home. Disoriented, unable to see the nightstand clock, I tried to figure out what time it was while Jasper pinned me down.

  “You awake?” Jasper said, his breath minty and fresh.

  He'd probably used Cecilia's toothbrush after a lengthy co-shower. He smelled good, the ends of his hair still a little damp. That he was finally sober and alert did nothing to stem my disdain for where he'd spent the night.

  “I am now,” I said, truculent and grumpy.

  A bouquet of flowers—white roses—appeared under my nose. The sweet scent temporarily overtook Jasper's freshly showered one. Instead of smiling, I frowned.

  “What are those for?” I asked.

  “Because I was an ass last night. I shouldn't have started drinking.”

  “Well. Thanks
, I guess. This is a nice gesture.” I cradled the bouquet against my chest, then leaned up with the intent of kissing his cheek in gratitude.

  He leaned down at the same time, coming in fast, and we wound up bonking foreheads.

  “Fin, what the hell...”

  “Ow, Jasper, what are you doing?” I slumped back, rubbing the spot I was sure would soon sport a goose egg. One of my eyes watered from the impact.

  “I was going to kiss you good morning, even through you're grumpy and scowling. What are you doing?” he countered, standing next to the bed instead of hovering over me.

  “I was gonna kiss your cheek! I didn't know. And you know what, you can just save your kisses for Cecilia.” Irritated and irrational, I sat up, then stood up, and brushed past him with the flowers in my arms. Afternoon light slanted in through the living room window, alerting me to the fact that many hours had passed since I'd gone to sleep. It had to be pushing four o'clock at least.

  “You're jealous,” Jasper said to my back. He sounded somewhat startled.

  “No I'm not.” Marching into the kitchen, I searched around for a vase. Since we didn't usually do flowers or vases, I came up empty.

  “Yes you are. For your information, I didn't spend the night with Cecilia.”

  I glanced over as Jasper strolled through the tiny living room in my direction. For the first time, I realized he was dressed for work. Except his suit looked...wrong. He looked great in it, though, broad shoulders filling out the black jacket, the white shirt and silver vest beneath offsetting his tawny hair and complexion.

  “Then where were you? I waited up half the night.”

  “I walked the city. Thinking. And I made a couple other stops earlier today.” Sliding his hands into his pockets, he leaned a hip against the counter, studying my eyes.

  I detected no lie in his demeanor or answer. “What were you thinking about?”

  “You.”

  “What about me?”

  “How to convince you to be with me...and only me. I can't do this whole thing where you use me when you want me, and I'm just Jasper the rest of the time.”