Page 40 of So Wrong It Must Be Right

“You havesomenerve.”

“You are supposed to be buying Carter Trask’s land, but instead I find you—”

“I have no interest in hearing what youfoundme doing,” Dinah returned, cold and angry and disgusted that he would go to such lengths. She couldn’t even be worried about how it would affect her deal with Carter, she was so outraged.

“I’ll be bringing this to the board.”

Dinah lifted her chin. “Go right ahead. I have a few things to bring to the board myself.”

A muscle ticked in Craig’s jaw as he narrowed his eyes at her. “Like what?”

Interesting. He very nearly sounded concerned. “I guess you’ll have to attend the meeting tomorrow and find out for yourself.”

“Watch your back, Dinah,” Craig muttered, stalking off in the opposite direction.

Dinah let out a shuddery breath. Though her uncle could be mean and intimidating, she’d never felt scared in his presence before. She didn’t care for it, especially when she would need to move Carter along on his decision now. She couldn’t let Friday’s board meeting pass without bringing up her suggestion.

She closed her eyes and turned into Kayla’s office. Craig knew about her and Carter. Which shouldn’t be a terribly big deal, but it would be. It made her look bad. It made her look stupid. It made her look young and foolish and everything the board already thought of her.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“So, it’s true.”

Dinah nearly jumped a foot when she realized Kayla was actuallyinher office, sitting behind her desk, looking pale and tired in a way that immediately worried Dinah. “Hey, are you all ri—”

“Are you really sleeping with him?”

Dinah blinked, surprised by the undertone of hurt in Kayla’s voice. “I . . . Kay, he . . . he’s the guy. The . . . the email guy.”

Kayla shook her head, her expression scrunching up. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, Carter is the guy I’ve been emailing. I mean, I didn’t know that until . . . Well. It’s not . . .” Dinah blew out a breath. She hadn’t thought about actually explaining this to her family. She really hadn’t thought about much.

The realization she’d lost sight of quite a few things since figuring out Carter and C were one and the same made it hard to catch a full breath. She was a planner, but she hadn’t planned this whole thing out at all.

“Why didn’t youtellme?”

Dinah tried to come up with an answer to that question. Kayla was her best friend and usually they told each other everything, but Dinah hadn’t wanted to tell anyone about this. Especially when it had all happened so fast and out of the blue and . . .

“I was sitting there, going to meetings with you to convince him to sell his land, and you were sleeping with him? You didn’t think I should have some clue that was going on, considering everything we were up against?”

“It wasn’t going on the whole time. It hasn’t even been going on that long. I just . . . happened to put all the pieces together that he justhappenedto be the guy I’d been . . . emailing. I know it’s a little crazy, but it’s true. So, I didn’t know how to . . .”

“Didn’t know how to tell me he was the guy you’d been emailing? Didn’t know how to tell me this man we were supposed tocrush, was someone you started sleeping with? And now you’ve got this insane idea to fold this guy into our businessafteryou slept with him? This isn’t like you, Dinah, and it’s messed up.”

“Look, I know it looks a little odd, but I promise it isn’t messed up in the least. You know I would never let anything come before Gallagher’s.”

“I don’t know that, actually.”

“Kayla!”

“I’m sorry, did you learnnothingfrom what your father did?”

Dinah felt as if she’d been slapped. Those words were certainly the metaphorical equivalent, and coming from Kayla . . . “That was hardly business, Kayla. I resent the implication—”

“You’re right. Not business. It was just my mom. My family. That’s all. Hardly important.”

Dinah stepped toward her cousin, anger mixing with some of the hurt. “You know I do not condone anything my father did. YouknowI’m just as furious at him for doing that to my mother as I am that he did it to your father, regardless of my feelings toward Craig. I don’t know how you could possibly compare me to him. I know something is going on with you, but turning it around on me is unfair and just plain mean.”

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