Page 282 of The Trouble With Bad Boys

“The what?”

“The DEA, and you’re in big trouble, Shelby.”

“I don’t do drugs, so I fail to see what you could want or need from me.”

“This is very serious. We’ve been investigating you for a long time.”

“Investigating me? For what?” And as his words sank in, everything we had done and said to one another came rushing back like some vicious slideshow. “The entire time you were with me was because you thought I had done something bad?”

I couldn’t believe it. The nights of unadulterated pleasure, heart to heart talks, and just basic companionship had been to pump me for information. I could barely believe what I was hearing, much less wanting to accept it. I couldn’t, and I wouldn’t.

“Not the whole time,” he told me.

Tears sprang to my eyes, and since he wanted to come here in an official capacity, I did the first of the only two things I could think to do. “Gemini.”

He chuckled at that. “We’re not at Syn, nor are we in that sort of situation right now so save your safeword.”

“Then I want to speak to a lawyer.” I pushed my bottom lip out, not even giving a damn if I came off as a pouter in this moment.

“Goddamn it, Shelby. You’re facing serious charges right now, the least of them being a sentence of twenty five years in prison.”

“For what? I didn’t do anything.” I responded passionately.

Being investigated was the last thing I needed. If it got out that I was even being accused of having anything to do with drugs, I’d lose my licenses and Oasis would be shut down. Somehow, that all seemed way worse than jail time. A few of those tears began to fall, and I tried to wipe them away with shaky hands.

“I need to show you some pictures,” he said in a more soothing voice.

He walked around my desk, then knelt down beside me. Having his face so close to mine right now began wreaking havoc on my senses, but I ignored his close proximity and focused on the photograph on his cellphone.

At first glance, it definitely looked like me. I saw my car parked in front of the bank, and I watched as I walked to the ATM, only I never used that particular location, especially after someone was mugged there just weeks before. Closing my eyes for a moment before reopening them, I knew who it was and my heart sank.

“Who is that, Shelby?”

My cousin was in a bad spot. What I hadn’t known before was that she had been in prison for a short stint twice over the last six years for theft. The last one had been with a prior. Carley had confided that coming to Denver was a way for her to rebuild her life like I had. She even talked of wanting to work at Oasis with me and become a better person. Now, a man I’d known for a short while wanted me to turn my back on her.

“That’s me at the bank withdrawing some cash. I didn’t know going to the ATM was a crime,” I lied.

“We both know that isn’t you,” he told me to which I just shrugged.

“Where’s the crime in banking? Did I barge in and hold the damn place up?”

“You know good and damn well you were not the one at the bank in this video.”

“And how can you be so sure?”

He grinned as he rose to his feet. “I know because at the time of this photo, we were at Syn and I was balls deep inside of you. There’s also video there to back me up, so I caution you to reconsider lying to me?”

I ignored what he said outwardly, but inside, my core clenched in remembrance. Easton had been so rough with me, and I’d eaten up every bit of it. In fact, I still craved the way he could so easily take control of my body, although I knew it could never again happen for us after all of this.

I wanted to rail at Carley, and I would once I got home, but this photo proved nothing. I glanced up at him and arched a brow. “What does going to the bank have to do with drugs?”

“Keep flipping through the pictures,” was all he said.

I scowled but did as he asked. Easton was right about these looking very incriminating. I watched as photo after photo showed Carley looking more suspicious. Still, there was no smoking gun as I’d often heard others say. Perhaps I could find a lawyer to get her off on whatever trumped up charges they tried to pin on her. Only, I couldn’t turn her in.

The problem was that I stood to lose everything if I didn’t. Did I sacrifice my budding relationship with my cousin? Or destroy my name and business to protect her? A few more tears started to fall, but I didn’t try to wipe them away this time.

I kept on scrolling through the gallery, eventually coming up to a series of shots of her handing a small plastic bag of something to a guy who looked to be college aged. I knew what a drug deal looked like because once upon a time, that woman had been me.

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