His Lovely Ward

Chapter 21

Chanty giggled and said, “I don’t know. He’s always like that.”

“He’s getting worse,” Cassandra rolled her eyes.

“Who’s getting worse?” Phillip asked innocently as he came up behind his wife, planting his hand on her waist.

“Willie,” Cassandra lied, giving Chanty and Angelica a wink. “His running and walking are getting worse.”

“Yeah,” Chanty added with a nod.

“Ange, let’s go?” Henry asked behind her.

Angelica took her eyes from the happy couple and nodded. “Yeah,” she answered and gave Cassandra a peck. “You’re lucky I got that guy or I’ll still be after your husband,” she joked.

“Yeah, lucky me,” Cassandra laughed.

“Bye, Phillip,” she gave him a peck as well and turned.

After saying goodbye to Chanty and the older Strindbergs, she walked with Henry to the car.

“So, are we going on a stakeout again?” she asked.

“No, we’re going on a date,” he grinned.

“What do you mean? It’s nearly twelve,” she looked at her watch.

“Let’s just take a little break for now,” he wheeled the car to the road and they drove on. “I need some bottles of beer,” he added.

  *****

Henry took her back to his apartment with six beer cans in hand.

“I thought we’re going on a date,” she said with disappointment on her face.

“We are,” he said gently. “Go grab a blanket and some pillows,” he ordered. Reluctantly, she did as she was told.

“What now?”

“We’ll go upstairs,” he said with a shrug. “And watch the stars. The view’s great up there by the way,” he took her hand and tugged. “Come on,” he motioned with his head, his grin growing wide.

What was wrong with him? He seemed different.

  *****

Nothing was really wrong with him. He just had a sudden attack of this feeling that the end was nearing. His innate instincts as an NSA agent were telling him they were on the right track and that they were near to catching who the killer was. And he wanted to spend some time with Angelica as much as he could without thinking of tasks or killers.

He led her to the roof deck without a problem, helped her spread the blanket on the ground, and lay there with her with a can of beer.

“Phillip said Cassandra likes stars,” he started with a frown. “I don’t see anything great about them.”

Angelica turned her head to look at him, amusement in her eyes. “You liked her before, right?”

“Who?”

“Cassandra. You liked her.”

“No,” he answered with a sigh. “I liked taunting her for some reasons I can’t share.”

“What reasons?”

“I just said I can’t share them.”

“What reasons?”

“It’s confidential. Forget about it.”

“Is it something about her and Phillip?”

“Yes.”