Page 47 of All Our Secrets

“Your office. Right now.”

One of Silas’s eyebrows raised at my authoritative tone. I swore if those brows could speak, they’d convey, “get a load of this chick ordering me into my own office.”

I didn’t wait to see if he followed. I stormed past him and Timmy, feeling heat crawl up my back when Silas fell in step behind me.

He shut the door to his office the second we were inside, and I rounded on him. “You hypocrite.” I jabbed my finger into his chest.

He snatched said finger and frowned. “Care to explain the accusation?”

“You said all that shit about me and my relationship with my mom while you let yours do the same thing to you.”

His dark eyes narrowed. “Who on God’s green earth have you been speaking with today?”

“I visited Sarah.” I held my chin up.

He grabbed the bridge of his nose. “No one keeps their mouth shut around here.”

“It doesn’t feel good, does it?”

He smirked. The wrinkled scars on his right side tightened, and the sight of it nearly stole my breath. “Well, if you’d bother to ask, you’d know that my mom’s gone again. I gave her a couple of days, then sent her on her way. Much like I did yours.”

“Really?”

“Really. Mine only ever needs money for a bit before she finds a new man to leech from.”

I yanked my finger away from him, moving the car seat to my other arm. I glanced down at my shoes, feeling awkward. I hadn’t expected him to answer me so easily. Instead of the argument I had come here expecting, he’d given me something else. Silas and I had something in common. Lack of parental love.

Maybe I didn’t come to yell. Maybe I came to check on him like he did me.

“She always been that way?” Like a coward, I decided to stare at the ground when I asked another personal question.

“Yeah. Why? You feeling sorry for me now?”

“No.” I raised my head and looked him in the eye. “You’re probably better off without her in your life.”

“Same for you.”

My heart quickened the longer I studied him. His pink, wrinkled scars. And his eyes… There was so much ofsomethingin those dark browns. Loneliness? Yearning? I shouldn’t wonder. I shouldn’t ask any more. I definitely shouldn’t keep holding his powerful stare. The one that had the power to dig deep and find therealme. The messy me. The needy and wanting me.

Impossible.

An ache began in my lower stomach and descended between my thighs. A need that built and built within those stinging sensations coursing through my clit. I couldn’t stand the effect his attention had on me anymore. I averted my gaze with a shrug. “Who would have thought we’d have similar mothers?”

Silas exhaled, shoulders drooping. Before I could make sense of the sudden change in his posture, he said, “I’m not surprised at all.”

Had Theodore mentioned my mother to him?

T.J. grunted. I set the car seat on the desk to check on him. While I did so, Silas stepped behind me. I bit my lip, ignoring the tingle that ran down my spine. The feeling was quickly replaced by shame.

It’s nothing.Just these hormones.

His voice was close. “Do you need anything from me?”

Notthe words I needed to hear when my entire body was prickling at his nearness.

Why did I come there? Honest to God, I shouldn’t be anywhere near my husband’s best friend. Not because of him, but me. It was time to put a stop to this. To fix myself before Silas broke me.

“No.” I twisted around to face him. “I also came here to tell you to stop. Thank you for everything you’ve done, but it’s too much.”

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