Page 172 of Dirty Damage

But my hands come up empty. No matter how hard I scrabble, I can’t seem to find the stupid phone.

“Where are you?” I hiss under my breath. “Come on, come on…?”

“Where is it?” he demands from behind me.

He’s not breathing down my neck or anything but it feels like he is. His anger has choked out all the air in the room.

“I… I can’t find it,” I stutter. “It was here; I’m sure I kept it right here. Maybe it fell out or…”

“Keep looking,” he orders stonily. “I don’t give a fuck for myself. Or for you and me. That no longer matters.”

What is that piercing stab in my chest? Can that be what a breaking heart feels like?

Struggling for breath, I race over to the big couch I use like a hamper and start riffling through pockets as though my life depends on it.

It very well might.

“I-it isn’t here,” I cry. “Itshouldbe here…!”

“Are you lying to me again?”

“No!” I exclaim, twisting around to face him. “I swear, Oleg. The phone should be here. I don’t know where it’s gone. It must have fallen or… I don’t know what could have happened.”

His granite jaw clicks. “What app did you use?”

“App?” I repeat stupidly.

All I can think of is the fertility app I check every morning like a prayer. Surely he can’t be talking about that, right?”

With a grimace, he gestures for me to follow him. Feeling like a lamb to the slaughter, I trudge quietly behind him, trying to think where I might have misplaced that burner phone.

If I can only show him what’s on it, he’ll realize that my communication with Drew was strictly about Sydney and nothing else.

As soon as we’re in his office, Oleg moves straight to his laptop. His hands move nimbly across the keyboard before he twists the screen towards me.

“Use your password to log into the cloud. I want to see exactly what you told him.”

Swallowing, I try what I think is my password.Incorrect passwordflashes across the screen. God,does this look bad.

“Let me guess.” Oleg sneers. “You can’t remember any of your passwords. Convenient.”

“It’s not convenient—it’s the truth!”

“Like accidentally sending out half-naked pictures of yourself to my whole damn company was the truth?” he scoffs. “Try again.”

His scalding tone lights a fire under me. I wrack my brain and, with a silently uttered prayer, I type in a password.

YES!

I manage to access my WhatsApp account. But the moment I pull up my text thread with Drew, I realize something is wrong.

“No…” I whisper.

He looks over my shoulder and scowls. “The thread is empty.”

“It wasn’t when I last checked. I swear to God…” I’m shivering in his shadow. I’m not even looking right at him but I can feel the fire in his eyes. I shake my head. “It must have been Drew. H-he’s done this to me before. Hacked into my accounts, deleted text messages, erased whole conversations to try and gaslight me into believing whatever he wants me to believe.”

Oleg raises his eyebrows in disgust. “And you expect me to believe thatthisis the man you chose to go to for help with your sister?”

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