Page 93 of Law Of Love

“What the fuck?” Hannah muttered. “He’s her bodyguard.”

I nodded, exhaling in disbelief. “I know.”

“What are you going to say to him?” she asked once we reached the foyer.

“I don’t actually know. Seeing him again felt… weird. Everything came rushing back at once. The bad stuff, but also the good stuff. I wasn’t expecting that to happen.”

“I guess you just have to decide if the good outweighs the bad.” My friend smiled. “I’ll wait in the car until you’re done.”

She scurried off while I sat on the foyer floor against the wall, waiting for Kaleb. I couldn’t even begin to think about what I wanted to say to him. I hadn’t prepared for this. Tapping my fingers against my thigh impatiently, I stared at the enormous clock on the wall, longing for the hands to tick faster.Every second felt like an eternity. My eyes drooped.

“Freya.”

I jumped at the soothing voice, noticing Kaleb standing above me with furrowed eyebrows. He’d changed out of his bodyguard uniform and was sporting a pair of jeans and a tight, long-sleeved black top. Fuck, did he look good.

I wiped my hands on my jeans nervously as I stood. “Oh, hi.”

“Hi.”

“You’re still here.” I paused. “I thought—I thought you would have been shipped off to another base.”

“I was going to be, but I took this job,” Kaleb said, grinding his teeth together, “so I could stay.”

I arched an eyebrow. “What?”

“They usually give the body guarding jobs to the lower-level workers who get paid a lot less. I wanted to stay assigned to my current base, and this was the only job going, so I took it.”

Madison Ainsley was a local singer. Although she was well known around the country, she didn’t perform shows or travel often, hence why it was so hard to get hold of tickets.I had heard she lived just a few towns away.

“You took a lower-level job just so that you could stay here?”

“I couldn’t leave, Freya. Not after… everything.” Kaleb’s voice was hoarse.

I clicked my tongue, resisting the urge to pick at my fingers. They were already red raw. “Did you know about my dad the entire time?”

We were going straight for the deep stuff.

“No, Freya. It was fucked that it was all linked so closely, but I only found out about your dad being involved with Will a couple of weeks before he took you. My chief can vouch for that.”

It was a relief to hear that Kaleb hadn’t known about my father for long, but my trust in him was still damaged, considering he wasn’t honest with me.

“Why didn’t you tell me? I understand you were in a difficult situation, but I deserved to know.”

“You’re right.” Kaleb nodded. “I was in the wrong for keeping it from you. I just didn’t know how to tell you. You were near graduating, and I didn’t want it to mess that up for you. I was expected to stay on the case until it was closed, and I didn't know how to explain to you that your father was a wanted man and I was supposed to be helping hunt him down. It was selfish of me, and I’m sorry. Words can’t describe how much I regret not admitting it to you right away."

“That night,” I clamped my eyes shut, “were you going to shoot my dad?”

Murderer.

Killer.

Kaleb’s voice interrupted the slimy one in my head. “I'm not going to lie to you, Freya. I don’t know. I’d like to say I wouldn’t have, but Will had a gun to your head, and I was willing to do anything to get him to let you go unharmed. I can’t truthfully tell you what I would have done if you hadn’t—“ he stopped, gulping before taking in my stiff form.

Talking about it was causing everything to resurface when all I wanted to do was bury it deep inside of my brain—so far down that I never had to think about it again. My therapist constantly reminded me of how dangerous that was, though. The coping tactic never worked in the long run.

“How is your dad?” Kaleb asked, taking the attention away from the subject of me being a murderer.

“In prison. I’m visiting him next week.”

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