Page 35 of Resolving Rumors

“That’s good news, so now the only complication I might run into is if she claimed squatters rights.”

“That’s it. Good job on not filing that certificate. You made things a lot easier on yourself.”

I scoffed. “I don’t know about that.” Someone banged on my front door again. “Gotta go, someone is here and they are relentlessly banging my door down.”

“Let me know if you need anything else and I’ll be in touch with any updates as they come in.”

I grunted my acknowledgement as I hung up and moved to the front door. No sooner did I open it than a fist flew into my face and knocked me straight on my ass.

“You fucking piece of shit! You broke my sister!”

“I’m trying to fix everything!” I cried out, though it sounded garbled since my nose had already started to swell and blood dripped down into my mouth. “Broke my fuckin’ nose.”

“You deserve worse,” Dallas huffed at me.

“I know,” I agreed. “How is she?”

“How the fuck do you think?”

“I haven’t seen her and she blocked my phone a couple weeks ago.” It sucked to admit that to my best friend, but especially because he was also her brother.

“Good for Vic. She knows her worth.” He sighed and shut the door then slid to the floor beside me. “Sort of,” he added at the last minute.

“What does that mean?” The bastard winced and shook his hand out as I watched through watery eyes.

“Come on,” Dallas huffed as he got back to his feet and held his left hand out to help me up. His right looked a bit swollen and I felt the tiniest amount of satisfaction that the sucker punch he’d thrown at my face hurt him too. “Let’s talk in the kitchen while I get some ice for this.” He held out his sore hand as he said that.

“What about this?” I pointed to my face.

“Live with it the same way my sister has been living with a broken heart all by herself.”

“What do you mean all by herself?”

“She has literally no one, asshole.” I stopped mid-stride as he said that.

“What about Jordan?”

I reluctantly had to follow behind Dallas as he continued to my kitchen on a mission. “Jordan is out of the picture and last I heard out of state by now too.”

“What the fuck happened?”

Dallas shrugged his shoulders and then slowly recounted everything that had been going on in Austin’s life and how that affected Vic too, since she used it - and what she believed to be the truth - to push her family away.

“At this point, I don’t know why she’s still keeping our relationship a secret.”

“Well, for two reasons, asshat. The first being you no longer have a relationship. As far as my sister is concerned, you chose your wife. The second being that she’s embarrassed to have been thrown away for the devil bitch. You’re still living with the woman, dipshit.”

That was when I sat my best friend down and told him the plan to rid myself of Justice once and for all. I hoped that it was also the plan to win Vic back, but time would tell.

“Man, I wish I was going to be here to see that shit play out.”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m headed out for the holidays on my own private getaway. My family is too fucking much these days.”

“Did you ever tell them about what you really do for a living?”

He grinned at me. “Besides co-own the Tippler’s Lounge with my brothers?” He asked.

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