Page 130 of The Last Goodbye

About fucking time, you mopey bitch. Go find your girl and bring her home.

Cutler

I’m a block away from you now. Let me take you to the airport.

That would be great. Thanks. I’ll be ready in five minutes.

Brody

Did you reach her?

No. Her phone is dead and she’s holed up in her apartment. She probably thinks I don’t want to see her.

Phoenix

I’m glad you’re going. I can’t handle when I’m not the grumpiest dude in the group.

Cannon

I promise you…you are always the grumpiest dude in the group. But Bass has been giving you a run for your money.

Brody

Proud of you, brother. Set your pride aside and go figure this shit out. She’s worth the fight.

She’s definitely worth the fight.

Cutler texted me when he pulled up, and I jogged out to where he was parked, then tossed my bag in the back of his truck and jumped in.

“I’m glad you’re going,” he said.

“Yeah, thanks for the ride. I need to see her face-to-face and find out what the fuck is going on.”

“I did do some digging, and unfortunately, a portion of Blue Sky Bay falls in a weird zoning ordinance. Being a small town outside of the city, when things were mapped out, somehow our downtown fell under a different ordinance, which means there’s no height restriction on that one particular section of town. They found a loophole.”

“How the fuck did that happen?”

“Just an oversight, I think. But I’ve reached out to River, who’s pulling the information for me. We can propose a new zoning ordinance, but it’ll take some time and some work. I don’t know if we can stop this project before it happens. We’d need to petition for the change and make sure this doesn’t happen again, at the very least.”

“Okay, I’m on board to help however I can. But I’ve got to figure out what’s going on with Briar first. That’s all I fucking care about at the moment. I don’t give a shit about whatever monstrosity they’ve got planned, because right now, I’ve got more important shit to deal with.”

He chuckled. “Sounds like a man in love.”

I didn’t roll my eyes or argue with him. I simply nodded.

I was a man who was crazy in love with a woman.

But I wasn’t going to admit it to anyone until I admitted it to her.

When he pulled up at the airport, I knew I was cutting it close on time. “I appreciate you driving me.”

“Go get your girl.”

“That’s exactly what I plan to do,” I said before getting out of his truck and grabbing my bag.

I hurried through the airport and made it to my gate just as the last group was boarding.

I’d landed in New York City and taken a car to the address Denton had sent me. He also let me know that her building had a doorman, so he’d called ahead and added my name to the approved visitor list. It was a corporate apartment that he managed.