No Escape | Book 2 of Possessive

SIXTEEN

Gabby's POV

I was in the kitchen, making dinner while Jack sat at the counter with his eyes glued to his phone.

I heard my work phone buzz on the counter next to me as it sat in the charger.

I set the wooden spoon I was using to sauté onions down on the counter then grabbed it real quick.

It was another email from Ms. Neil, and it turned out to just be an audio file.

I glanced over at Jack who was still on his phone and played the audio file while turning the volume on the phone down.

At first it was just rustling like the phone was in her pocket as she was walking, then I heard a man's voice confronting her. It started out as a calm conversation then got pretty heated pretty fast. I listened as he scolded her about leaving him. She remained calm as he called her out of her name and threatened her, telling her he was going to beat her, kill her, and take all of her money.

"You don't want the food to burn, babe." I jumped as Jack came up behind me and I quickly paused the audio clip, then I noticed that the sautéd onions were starting to really burn.

"Shit!" I cursed to myself then set down my phone and picked up the wooden spoon again.

"What were you listening to?" Jack asked as he wrapped his hands around my waist and placed a kiss on my shoulder.

"It was just... I can't say." Which is true since I can't really share evidence with him.

"Mm," he nodded his head "confidential, huh?" He rested his chin on my shoulder.

"Yep, but anyways, how was your day?" I asked, trying to change the subject.

"Uh," he hesitated "It was good." I could tell he was lying.

"I'm not clueless, Jack. What happened?" I asked as I continued to keep mixing the onions up.

"Remember the presentation I had today?" He asked.

"Yeah, of course."

"I didn't exactly present that." I could hear the wince in his voice.

"Wait, what?" I turned around to face him.

"Yeah, it's a funny story," I crossed my arms over my chest because I could tell that nothing about this was going to be funny.

"Well, I got there about fifteen minutes early like you suggested, right?" He started off and I nodded.

"Then, when I got there, someone was already presenting and when I asked her about it after she presented, she said that I was late and that she couldn't contact me." He was playing with his thumbs as he rocked back and forth from his toes to his heels.

"Are we talking about who I think were talking about?" I asked.

"Yes," he said while looking up and wincing at me.

"Oh my God, Jack," I rolled my eyes "What was her reasoning? You were supposed to present at 9:30."

"She said the time changed to 9:00, but she couldn't tell me because she didn't want my wife to overreact." He said the last part quieter.

I was shocked at the level of immaturity.

"Do you need me to talk to her, Jack?" I asked.

"No, I can handle it myself."

"Did you ask her about the other thing?" I asked.

"I did, but she denied that it was her," He responded and looked back up but his eyes looked past me "Gabby, the onions."

I immediately turned around and turned the stove off then faced him again.

"I told you not to ask her about it." I sighed.

"I know, but I needed to know."

"She wasn't going to answer honestly. Why would she even need to?" I asked.

"I told her that there's photographic evidence."

"And how are you going to get that photographic evidence, Jack?" I asked and he shrugged.

I put my face in my hands and took a deep breath.

"How do we even know it was actually her? There could just be plenty of coincidences." He said.

"I could recognize her from the pictures, and you even remember her name." I said and he just let out a sigh.

"Jack, clearly she is going to be very immature about all of this," I wrapped my arms around his neck and he wrapped his hands around my waist "Always be the bigger person, and please just do what you need to do to thrive with this company until your contract expires. Please don't let her ruin it for you." He just nodded in response and lightly kissed my forehead.