Wild Forces: A Friends to Lovers Romance (O-Town Book 2) by Karen Renee (summer reads .TXT) 📕

“Tonight? But, shouldn’t we do this at my place? Your—”

“Baby, I can’t tie you up with that fancy headboard you got, that looks more like the back of a sofa. My bed’s wood slats. Lots of ways to play.”

My belly flooded with warmth and did a pleasant dip at the same time. “You’re joking,” I whispered.

“No,” he whispered as he cupped my chin. “So, you can drop your purse, and ditch the sandals. Hell, ditch all your clothes, baby.”

WHEN I REPORTED TO work in the morning, I found myself feeling muscles I’d never felt before. All compliments of Gabe finding my limits, and the reminder of how he did that made me smile.

During the evening, Ryan had sent me several emails. The last one included instruction that all media invoices would be handled by Wendy.

Something told me Ryan would limit my access to the digital copies of the other media invoices starting today, if he hadn’t done it already. With a few clicks of my mouse, I was able to pull up an invoice for a well-known radio station. Grabbing a post-it note, I jotted down their phone number and the name of the account executive handling the club’s business.

Yesterday, I had saved a PDF copy of the invoice for WORL-FM. Like the other invoice, it included the address and phone number to the radio station. I grabbed my desk phone and called the station.

The line rang five times, and then it went to an automated voice message. That seemed strange since most businesses, even if their phone system was automated, would have a menu to route the calls.

I hung up the phone, and Ryan appeared at the door.

His expression turned suspicious. “Personal call, Miss Daughtry?”

I smiled. “No. There was no answer, and I didn’t want to leave a voice message.”

“Did Rhonda show you the quarterly reports? I don’t have the second quarter report, and I need that as soon as possible.”

“She did. I’ll get that to you before lunch.”

“Great. And, you saw my message about Wendy handling invoices from the media? My thinking is that will help lighten your load since you’ll be going back to class soon, right?”

I nodded. “If that’s what you think is best, then they’re all Wendy’s.”

“Good. I’ll let you get back to work.”

As promised, I sent the quarterly accounting report to Ryan just before lunch.

I grabbed my purse and headed to a nearby diner. Once I finished my meal, I grabbed the sticky note and my cell phone. My call to our account executive at WPXO-FM went to voicemail, and I left a message to call my cell.

The rest of the afternoon went by in a blur of paying vendor invoices and reconciling the account balance. On my way home, my cell rang. I used the hands-free on my steering wheel to answer.

“Hello?”

“Cassandra Daughtry?” a female voice asked.

“This is she.”

“Hi, this is Megan Jones with WPXO.”

I smiled. “Hi, Megan. I’m so happy you were able to get back to me.”

“No problem. I’ve been trying to reach Ryan Pruitt for over a month. I know he’s crazy busy with the club, but I thought another live remote would help business.”

My smile dimmed. “Ah, well. I’m not sure about that, I had more of a general question for you.”

“Oh, you’re not able to make any buying decisions, or has he settled on an advertising agency to help him with marketing?”

“Not to my knowledge. Listen, I was curious, are you aware of a new station in town called WORL-FM?”

“I know there’s an AM station with those call letters.”

I realized calling this station might not have been a good idea. “But, most of the radio stations in town are all owned by larger corporations, right?”

“Yes,” she said.

“And that isn’t one of your company’s stations with new call letters?”

“Certainly not. Anytime a station has a call letter change, we know about it. Does Club Eclectic have a campaign running with this station?”

“Well, I can’t get a hold of our contact there. The number goes straight to voicemail, not even a phone tree.”

She paused. “You won’t have that problem with me, Cassandra.”

“All right. I’m sorry, it seems I’ve wasted your time.”

“No, not at all. Anything I can do to help, that’s what I’m here for, Cassandra.”

I thanked her for her time and rang off.

WHEN I GOT HOME, I quickly changed into a t-shirt and shorts. Then I pulled some frozen chicken breasts out and made my short-cut version of chicken tacos. After I mixed the seasoning packet with two-thirds of a cup of water, I poured it over the breasts, covered the Pyrex dish with foil, and put them in the oven to roast.

My cell rang, and I saw it was Dad.

“Hey, there. How goes things?”

“Good, my dear. Are you at home?”

“I am. Where are you?”

“I’m pulling into your complex, and thought I’d drop by for a visit.”

I smiled. “Okay. If you want, you can stick around for chicken tacos.”

He chuckled. “That sounds nice, but I wasn’t planning to stay that long.”

Five minutes later, I let Dad into the apartment.

I opened a Sprite Zero and poured it into two glasses. “Any particular reason you dropped by?”

He perched a hip on a stool. “Not exactly. Thought I’d hear how your job is going. I have to stop myself from calling you during work hours, but I’m curious what you’ve found out. If anything.”

I pressed my lips together. “It’s funny you’re here. I found this invoice for a radio station I’d never heard of, but Ryan claims they recently had a call letter change.”

Dad nodded. “That does happen.”

I dipped my chin. “You’re right, but I got a call back from another radio rep today, and she hasn’t heard of this particular FM station, just those call letters but on the AM side. And, I tried calling the phone number listed on the station’s invoice; it went straight to automated voicemail, but not an automatic phone menu, you know?”

Dad nodded slowly, but didn’t say anything.

“And, this