Page 44 of Dirty Rival

“He’s gone. Focus on the company. Focus on you.”

She studies me for several beats and when I expect her to push on her father, she hits me from another direction. “Okay then. Elijah. Tell me why you won’t do business with him.”

She’s now hit two of my brick walls. I rotate forward and pick up my coffee. “No.” I take a drink.

“No?” she demands.

“No,” I repeat.

“Reid.”

I set my cup down and look at her without turning. “It’s personal.”

“Trust me enough to tell me. Because let’s be honest. You earning my trust is a façade. You don’t have to earn my trust. I’ve been forced into that trust.”

She’s right. Professionally she does have to trust me. Personally, she doesn’t, and trust is the most intimate and dangerous thing two people can share. It cuts. It burns. It destroys. I know this all too well, and yet, foolishly that’s exactly what I want from her. I turn to face her. “You demand that my trust be given freely and yet you say yours is forced.”

“If my gut didn’t say to trust you, Reid, I’d be looking for a job. I just want you to validate my gut feeling. And I want you to have the same gut feeling about me.”

My lips tighten. I’m diving into treacherous water with this woman. I need to pull back. “Elijah hates me. That’s what you need to know. You’ll lose everything if you get involved with this man. I’ll lose millions. You need to understand that. I put my name, my family name, on this deal.”

“I can talk to him. I can make him see reason. I can appeal to his humanity. This is my life. This is—”

I grab her arm and pull her to me. “He’s like me. He’s barely human. I ruin people. He ruins people. It’s business, the kind that requires no emotion be present to succeed. It requires no heart. In fact, a heart is a detriment. I am that and he is, too. You are not. He’ll cut you, fuck you every which way, and then leave you with nothing. All to cut me. I’m not going to let that happen.”

“Because you have too much to lose.”

“We, Carrie. We have too much to lose.”

“But you have no heart. You don’t care about me.” Her fingers flex where they rest on my chest like she wants to push me away as much as she wants to keep touching me. I know that feeling every damn second that I’m with her. “I know how quickly you could turn on me,” she adds, “and thank you for reminding me that I can’t let myself forget that.”

She hates me in this moment. Hate is what I need her to feel and if I told her exactly why Elijah wants to hurt me, she’d hate me even more, and yet, I don’t want her to feel those things. And fuck. I can’t seem to just let her go. “You’re different,” I say. “You’re different from everyone else, Carrie. I’ll protect you. I already am.” I pull back and let her see the truth in my eyes as I repeat, “I’m protecting you with Elijah and I know you don’t understand my decision on this. If my word isn’t enough, know this: I stand to lose millions if you fail. I would not let go of a deal that delivers us to our goal. This is not it.”

She studies me several beats, seeming to size up my statement before she says, “Okay then, I accept that he’s the enemy, but he’s the enemy with money. Can we not burn him the way he wants to burn us? And wouldn’t using his money to succeed be burning him?”

I release her, but my hand catches her leg. “It’s too risky.” And then I dive into the quicksand again. “I need you to trust me on this. Set Elijah aside, Carrie. I’ll make-up the lost deal. I’ll replace it and we’ll succeed.”

“I don’t want you to make this happen,” she says vehemently. “I want to do it. I want to make this happen. This deal with Elijah does that for me and us.”

“It doesn’t. It’s a set-up. It’s certain destruction. And as for doing this yourself, if we both bring a deal to the table, we’ll win even bigger together. Set Elijah aside. Promise me.”

“Reid—”

“Promise me.”

“Okay. I promise. What about my father?”

“Yes. Set him aside, too.”

“So everything I ask you, you tell me to set aside. How is this proving you have no agenda, well, aside from secret agendas?”

“Ask me something else, Carrie.”

“Tell me about the case you’re handling against the DA.”

I don’t ask her why this matters to her. I know. It’s a character assessment after I just told her I have no heart. “That I can do. I don’t know what you’ve pieced together, so I’ll recap. There was a serial killer. The clients I represent, Cole and Lori, are the husband and wife team that represented the innocent man accused of the crimes. When he was found innocent, one of the victim’s family members attacked Lori in a public bathroom. Had the DA reopened the case, that might not have happened, nor would the real killer have killed again, but he did.”

“How did you end up with this case? I mean, I know you don’t like to be called a raider, but you operate in a similar zone. Civil actions again the DA don’t seem like your thing.”

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