Page 36 of The Inquirer

Point four. The law firm employed by that family – Bradyn’s family – was the same law firm that my abusive asshole of a stepfather had come to New York from. One that his family had started three generations ago.

It was that point that made me wonder what I was missing.

Was it possible that all of those points could be coincidences?

Or was it fate? Destiny? The universe?

Was that what had brought Bradyn and me together each of these times? Some higher power that wanted us together?

I had a hard time believing that anyone or anything actually cared about two random people hooking up a few times.

Except that wasn’t all he wanted anymore. Or, honestly, not what he’d wanted in the first place. For all I knew, it’d never been some one-off for him. It wasn’t like we’d really spent much time talking that first time, and after that, all sorts of shit kept coming up. It was hard to have a conversation about where we saw our future if I kept having flashbacks to my shitty past.

Not that I would’ve had an answer for him then any more than I did now.

Then again, maybe I would’ve been able to tell him no at that point. One night with him at Hades could’ve been it. I wouldn’t have told him about my stepfather or about being in juvie. I wouldn’t have cared that he’d set himself at odds with his family.

I shook my head and sighed. I didn’t know why I bothered with the what if shit. It never did anyone any good. I couldn’t change the past and all thinking about it did was give me one more headache to deal with.

The whole coincidence-destiny question, however, was one that I still needed to figure out. Mostly because there was a third option.

Manipulation.

I hadn’t mentioned anything to Bradyn about my personal connection to Check & Sons because I hadn’t wanted to risk him finding out what I’d done as a teenager. I wasn’t in his head, though, so I didn’t have a way to know for certain that he didn’t already know. That he hadn’t been orchestrating this from moment one.

Even as I thought it, I rejected it. I’d already thought once that he’d had some ulterior motive, that he’d known my identity when we first met. I couldn’t go through that all over again, especially since I knew it’d be a lie.

Hard as it was for me to admit, there was only one reason I was even considering the idea that Bradyn had been responsible for everything that’d happened in Savannah. I was terrified.

I’d gone to him automatically after my flashback a few days ago, like it was some sort of instinct to reach for him. If I’d been thinking, I probably would’ve talked myself out of it, but I’d been too freaked out to make a logical choice. If I hadn’t felt safe with him, I wouldn’t have gone. What happened afterward was what had me scared and looking for excuses.

The fact that I couldn’t find distance a good enough excuse was another warning that I was in deeper than I liked. But, if he’d lied and manipulated, I’d feel justified in pushing him away.

I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t falsely accuse him just to make myself feel better.

I also couldn’t spend the rest of my time here hiding, if for no other reason than the fact that this investigation was too tied up with Bradyn’s life. Avoiding him wasn’t the answer, and it wasn’t fair to him. No matter what happened between us from here on out, he was a good guy. Not perfect, not without faults, but he was a good man.

I rubbed my burning eyes and wondered if I’d be able to get much rest tonight. I’d been having dreams ever since Tuesday night, the vivid, intense dreams that made sleep not very restful. They weren’t nightmares, though, and it wasn’t fear making me wake up sweaty and with a pounding heart. And it wasn’t being scared that had made me come more than once while I’d been sleeping.

Just thinking about them made my pussy throb.

“Dammit.” My head thudded against the back of my chair. “I don’t need to fuck him again.”

My body disagreed.

Hell, every part of me disagreed. As much as I was tempted to write things off as purely physical, I couldn’t do it without lying. Sure, there’d been stuff we hadn’t talked about, but it wasn’t as if we’d only ever spent time having sex.

When it got down to it, that was what bothered me the most. It’d hurt when he’d made those accusations. It’d be worse if I chose to get to know him better, and then things imploded.

That was the same reason I’d tried to keep Kaimi at arm’s length back when we first met, but I’d barely been a teenager, and I’d needed someone to watch my back. That had pushed me into trusting her much faster than I would have under other circumstances.

I needed a drink.

I got up and discovered that I’d apparently had my last beer at lunch, which left me with water or apple juice. At least Shadae had remembered that I didn’t drink sweet tea, and I hadn’t even needed to explain why.

I pushed the thought away as soon as it came. No good would come from falling down that particular rabbit hole.

Juice it was.

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