Page 22 of Ruthless Love

“Yes, crazy head. And not just because you’re technically a volunteer, though that makes you staying all the more attractive.”

“Bite me.”

“I’m actually serious. One day, you need to actually let the company pay you. You’re the best lead counsel we’ve ever had. Jack Marley refused to retire until we found someone amazing. He said, and I quote, ‘Evie’s the best no-bullshit attorney I’ve ever worked with.’ No one can keep up with you. How a big law firm hasn’t snapped you up is beyond me.”

“I didn’t want to work at a big law firm. The politics and back-stabbing ladder-climbing pissed me off before I even started. But this isn’t work. It’s fun. You give me enough creative rope to hang myself, and I keep pulling one loophole after another right out of my butt. Win-win.”

“But you can’t work for free forever.”

I shrug away her concerns. “Sure I can. I don’t need the money. Donate it.”

In the silence between us, I think she understands. Hope she understands.

Don’t take this from me.

Margot’s hug reassures me that she’s not trying to cut bait and run, but it draws out so long that it creates a suffocating awkwardness. Now I’m wondering what she wanted to talk with me about in the first place.

“Then why the serious eyes and frowny face?” I ask. “You came in here to say something.”

With a final tight squeeze she does just for fun because she knows it will annoy me, Margot releases me. It lets me breathe, but I miss the warmth of it in an instant, and wonder how I go for such long stretches without the caring touch of another human being.

“It’s none of my business,” she says, which means whatever it is, she’s about to make it her business. “About your impending nuptials that I ...” Embroiled in a mental tug-of-war, she searches for the right words.

I know where this is going, where she’s going, and I have to look away. The never-ending city view of impressive tall buildings grabs my interest, and I swivel to avoid Margot’s eyes and welcome the distraction of the familiar Dallas skyline.

When Margot doesn’t continue, her astute sensitive nature once again overtaking her need to pry, I let her off the hook.

“You don’t have anything to worry about, Mom. I’m a grown-ass girl and I know what I’m doing.”

“Do you?” she asks so tenderly that I fail to blink back a runaway tear. “There’s been talk,” she says, carefully sprinkling the lightest layer of salt on my fresh wound. “About Dimitri. The kind of ... man he is.”

My heart sinks, heavy with unease, and I swallow the knot of nerves in my throat. I barely turn back toward her, because the truth is that I don’t know the man I’m engaged to.

Honestly, I tried to get to know him on a real and personal level. Not the sensationalized paparazzi level that twists and distorts every shred of truth into something that sells papers. And a rich Russian power-hungry playboy sells. Hell, Banks Multimedia is the spokesmodel for selling that shit.

But this is more than just a hot hunk who can’t keep his cock in a cage. There are stories. In the media game, there are always stories. But my own father had Dimitri investigated by his corporate bloodhounds. I saw his report, which said that nothing could be substantiated. Not one thing.

But I’ve known Margot a long time. Love her or hate her, she’s never wrong.

Sensing the tremble in my voice before I speak, I suck in a calming breath, tightening my words to avoid the stammer she’ll latch on to. “Like what?”

“It starts with how he made his money—theft mostly—that escalates to bribery.” Her words trail off, and I can see by her worried expression she’s deliberately holding back.

“Go on,” I say insistently, my gaze fixed unseeing on the skyline.

“When deals go wrong, people get ... hurt. Go missing. There’s talk of trafficking. Drugs, as well as people.”

Her words die down for good because there’s more. A lot more. Too much more. But she’s said all she will, and I give her a solemn nod as if I somehow understand.

I pull myself together, clasping my hands tight in my lap as I softly respond. “Rumors. Conjecture. Even a shred of evidence, and the Feds would be all over him. But they’re not.”

The attorney in me has jumped in, arguing with the facts I can see. My voice is level. Speculative. Processing the words I just uttered, I replay them in my head, unsure if I’ve managed to convince the one person who needs convincing.

Me.

“Of course,” she says, and my desperate eyes find hers, pleading for some semblance of, I don’t know, approval.

Uncharacteristically, it’s Margot’s turn to turn those big observant eyes away for only the second time in our lives.

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