He stalked to the wall near his desk and with one sweep of his arm, sent all the framed commendations and awards for his service directly into the garbage can in a splintering crash.
I had to stifle a gasp. Fuck.
“I will not investigate Clementine Adler,” he said dangerously.
“If you don’t go along with this,” the Chief said, his face looking white with anger, “you can kiss any chance of a promotion goodbye.”
“I don’t care,” Grayson said. “I will not consider Clementine a suspect in anything. I won’t chase Harvey Adler around in circles again. I’m not doing it.”
Chief Thomas looked pissed, his mouth tightening in anger.
“Harvey Adler has stolen from the government, and he’ll do it again. Don’t you care about justice anymore?”
Grayson shook his head. “This isn’t justice. I quit.”
The feed cut out as the door slammed behind him.
My heart was thrumming with adrenaline.
“Seen enough?” I asked.
She turned to me in a fury, her nostrils flaring.
“He’ll change his mind. There’s no way.”
My hand closed around my own phone, my fingers skimming past my passcode.
And then they pressed record.
“You left those panties in the glove box on purpose, didn’t you?” I asked.
“I sure did,” she snapped, getting up from the table. “You needed to know he wasn’t yours.”
“Yes, I was,” a deep voice came from the front door of the coffee shop. “I was hers and I am hers.”
Vivi went beet red with embarrassment and chagrin.
“Still trying to make up for what you did?” she asked tauntingly, smiling at Grayson with a tight grimace.
“Yes,” he said, barely even flicking a glance in her direction, his eyes glued on me. “I’m always going to be trying to make it up to her, and it’s never going to be enough. I was an asshole who should’ve seen the value of what I had. I should have treated her right from the beginning, not thrown a treasure away for some cheap garbage.”
“Asshole,” Vivi hissed as she stalked away.
“Grayson, I—saw part of what happened in there,” I confessed.
“Clementine, I am so sorry. I put—I put my career before you. Looking back I can’t believe I made such a stupid mistake. I don’t know how I could have been so blind. The things I thought made me a good and honorable man were—false. What would have made me a good man was being a good husband to you. Not taking advantage of you.”
My throat felt so tight that I could barely swallow.
“And I should never—never have gotten up on that stand to testify against you,” he said, “I should have gone to jail rather than do that. It’s the most shameful, stupid moment of my life.”
My throat felt tight and constricted, tears prickling at the corner of my eyes.
“My dad is a con man,” I said.
There was a muscle throbbing in Grayson’s jaw and his face looked grim and set, but his lips twisted up at me.
“I know he is.”