Page 69 of Hunter

“Bella, those are for you…” I trail off, not wanting to face the words I put on the page, the years of pouring my heart out to a woman I never thought would read them, until she returned.

“But you wrote them, and on those pages are thousands and thousands of words that prove just what a good man you are. You need to see him too.” She rises up on tiptoe, pressing plump warm lips to mine.“I’m going back to bed. Bring our letters, and let’s face this together.”

***

Isabella

Hunter’s phone buzzes again as I return to bed. I glance at the screen and see Damon is calling. I debate whether to answer the call on my husband’s behalf, considering if our relationship is at that point yet.

The ringing stops, only to begin again, the same caller desperate for Hunter’s attention. Deciding that the fact we are married and actively planning a family does in fact give me the right to answer my husband’s calls, I pick up the cell.

“Hello, Hunter’s phone,” I say, my tone professional. All I am met with is silence on the other end. “Hello.”

“Isabella?” the semi-familiar voice responds.

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry to interrupt. This is Damon. Is Hunter there?”

“She’s answering his phone,” another male voice says in the background. “Fuck, it must be serious.”

“Shut up, Chase,” Damon mutters, and my mind immediately goes to the older brother Russell. He seems more likely to make stupid comments than Connor.

“You can tell him we’re married,” I say with a laugh. “Hunter will be back in a moment.”

As the words leave my lips, the bedroom door opens again. Hunter is still stark naked, walking across the room, clutching the box of letters I asked him to retrieve. For a moment, I worry that I overstepped, answering his call from his friend perhaps wasn’t the correct thing to do, but then his face breaks into the most stunning smile.

“Thank you, Bella,” he says, placing the letters on the bed then reaching for his phone. He takes it as I begin to rummage in the box for the letters I want to show him, determined to prove to him that he is a good man. I listen to his conversation with Damon, something about needing to meet. There has been progress in something.

“I’ll be there later,” Hunter says. “It can wait. I need to be with me wife just now.” Damon obviously pushes back on my husband’s reluctance. His eyebrows furl as his expression darkens. “McKinney, this is what I pay you for. Collect the information, and I will deal with it when I get there. I’ll have the cleaner transferred to the Level. You can interrogate her while you wait for me.”

Hunter cuts the call before the other man can say anything else. He turns back to me.

“Do you need to go?” I ask him. He shakes his head. “What is happening with Kasia?”

He sits down beside me and plucks the envelope I’m holding from between my fingers.

“That can all wait,” he says, his voice soft. “Now, show me what you wanted me to see. Our future is more important to me than any business deal or vengeance. You, Bella, are my priority.”

Chapter thirty-two

The Level Boardroom

Hunter

The crystal slams down on the glass boardroom table, a shrill ring echoing off the walls. The familiar scent of leather, coffee, and impending vengeance hangs thick in the air. Normally, the danger would ground me, give me confidence in the reason for me walking on this earth, but today, it feels suffocating. There’s so much more to life than this shit.

Damon paces up and down the boardroom. Russell has his Italian leather shoes on the table, leaning back in his chair, unworried. Connor and Harrison pour over a digital map, murmuring about ships, positions, and movements.

But all I can think about is Isabella. Her words, what she said. How she thinks of me.

You need to see the man I see.

The chaos in the room disappears as my mind returns to only a few hours ago when I refused Damon’s request to come here. When the most important thing in my world was lying with her in bed and pouring over letters I’d written to her throughout my life ? ones I never sent and never intended her to read.

Her voice still echoes, every kind word and positive moment a sign of her unwavering belief in me. I don’t think I’ve ever known anyone to believe in me as much as she does, and it’s kind of ironic since we’ve spent so much time apart. But her determination that I am good, I felt it in every damn word she said.

The first letter she pulled from the box was written a few years after our separation. It was a time when I threw myself not only into my family’s dark world, but also my backup plan. One of the small businesses I owned, a mechanic garage, had been targeted by local thieves. Not only had the business lost assets, but my staff members had been personally stolen from. Wages taken that were left in jackets, personal belongings gone. I’d replaced everything lost as best I could.

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