Page 110 of Fierce-Hyde

She unlocked her car and they got in. “My mother again. And I pretty much told her off.”

“Tell me what happened,” he said.

He listened while she explained it all. “I’ve never talked to her like that before. I think I just had enough. I don’t even know if she’s going to sign the lease and I don’t care. She can’t come live here with me. I can’t do it. I can barely do it from states away.”

“You probably don’t want to hear this,” he said, “but I think you did the right thing even if it feels like shit.”

“It totally feels like shit. She even asked me about you and then made some stupid comment about us not being in the same building and you getting mad if I took a new job. It set me off. But what did I do? Call you to come talk to me.”

“And I would have been annoyed if you didn’t,” he said. “We talked about this, remember?”

“We did,” she said. “And I hate that I’m crying like this. I never do.”

“And look at that,” he said. “You never cry and you say you never lose it with your mother, but you did. So it’s not just me bringing it out of you. Do you know how good that makes me feel?”

She laughed when his words registered and made sense. Then she was laughing so hard she couldn’t catch her breath.

“Maybe like you, this is me all along just locked up. That I’m not changing, but going back to the way I should or want to be.”

“There you go,” he said. “And since I’m here with you because you called me, I don’t care what explanation you put on it.”

34

LET HER GUARD DOWN

“Is everything okay with Tori?” Raina asked when he got back to his office.

Hyde barely had time to sit down before Raina was there looking anxious.

“How did you know I was with Tori?” he asked.

“You ran out of here so fast. I was in Drake’s office and saw you jogging out. I might have thought nothing of it, but then Tori just texted that she had to tell me what a fool she’d been. I don’t know what that means, but she said she was going into a meeting now.”

He wasn’t going to think it was bad. Not with the way they’d ended their conversation.

“She’s good now,” he said. “I’ll let her fill you in. But it had to do with her mother.”

“Urgh,” Raina said. “Tori never puts her foot down. I’m not sure how she does it and I don’t lecture because it’s not my life.”

“Oh, she put her foot down,” he said, smiling. “Again, she can fill you in. But things are good. I think they are.”

“I’m glad she called you,” Raina said. “I hope you know how huge that was for her to do that.”

“I do,” he said. “I think it scared her some too, but she’s getting there.”

“Looks like you both are,” Raina said. “It’s nice to see.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I think. You know, I don’t like putting you in the middle.”

Raina walked over and shut the door. “Go ahead and do it. I won’t tell you anything I don’t think you should know. You know that.”

“I know I’m wearing her down,” he said. “I think she finally realizes that how she acts and feels about me isn’t just me bringing bad things out of her.”

“She doesn’t feel that way, Hyde. I’m telling you right now she doesn’t.”

“She told me that.”

“But you doubt it?” Raina asked.

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