Page 5 of Free to Run
Even though we never knew each other before our time trapped in that horrific shipping container, I felt a bond snap between us. Then when we became six, our lost souls found a new home. All we lost we found. Together.
Once we changed our names, I chose Alison since it was my mother’s middle name. Louise Sibley ceased to exist except in the darkest recess of my mind. I wanted nothing to associate me with my father.
If I have to applaud Max Sibley for anything, at least he tried to sell me in a state with some of the strictest human trafficking laws in the nation. He got 144 years on top of his drug charges. He won’t be out in his lifetime.
My sisters always claim I’m the life of the party, the person who lights up a room with a smile, yet I hardly know who I am. It’s why I started writing some of my thoughts out, to get rid of these emotions no one would ever associate with me. I feel like I’m going mad with no one to talk to. So many people think I have it together, and I do for the most part, except for love or anyone getting too close to my heart.
Love, that feckless, backstabbing bitch. That turncoat traitor. The hand that will disappear to let you fall into the bottomless well.
Men are such liars, such assholes. I’d learned the hard way to be wary of them. Look at what happened when I needed things like food and shelter. The price for that landed me on an auction block to benefit Dad.
I also need to remember what happens when I ask a man to rescue me from a silly dare, and the connection I felt that enticed me to blow off my brother’s wedding reception to sneak up to my suite. How could I forget his emerald-green eyes that looked into the depths of my soul every time his body connected with mine? I only need to remember him sneaking out without his pants on, eager to run away.
Bastard.
I should have just ruined the shoes instead of ruining my… No. I refuse to call it my heart.
Blinking rapidly behind my sunglasses, I downshift into a tight turn. After everything that happened when I was a teenager, I have zero tolerance for lies. I wholeheartedly believe in telling the truth, especially to myself.
I have no problem with people choosing to live their lives how they please, but don’t lie to me. Don’t pretend to be something or someone you’re not.
And I’m done lying to myself about Keene Marshall.
I was nothing more than a one-night stand to him. Correction, a two-night stand. Not that anyone knows that. It’s unpleasant having to accept I’ve been nothing more than a warm place for him to stick his cock in when he needed a release.
Pressing my lips together, I get my bearings before turning back toward town.
Sighing, I realize I have to find the protective shield I wear for anyone who’s not allowed inside my heart. That means they get the dazzle, the charm, and the smile, but they’ll never see behind it to the real me.
How does that saying go? Burn me once, shame on you. Burn me twice, I’ll take a torch to you…or some shit like that.
Turning my car down the next street, I make my way back to the farm for a family dinner I don’t particularly want to attend, knowing I’ll have to force a little more dazzle into my smile because of one particular family member.
The only thing keeping me from bailing out of this fiasco of a night is my curiosity over Cassidy and Caleb’s announcement.
3
Keene
“Irepeat, is that understood?” I coldly address the room full of analysts sitting in front of me.
I’m holding my iPad that contains the files Caleb forwarded to me earlier. Their colossal mistake caught by our more seasoned analysts in New York managed to delay my leaving the Reston, Virginia, office of Hudson Investigations by several hours.
“Mistakes like this will not be tolerated. Consider this a written warning for everyone in this room. On this assignment you work as a team; therefore, you take your punishment as a team.” I pause for brevity. “You will also lose your jobs as a team if there’s not more attention paid to details.”
The silence that settles over the occupants of the room would weaken the heart of a lesser man. With few exceptions, it’s a good thing a heart is something I don’t have.
“Fix it. By Monday. If you have a problem with that, speak with your immediate supervisor. Otherwise, when I check in, this issue better be resolved.” I toss the iPad into my bag and swing it onto my shoulder. Without another word, I stride out the door.
I’m maybe fifty feet from the conference room when I hear my name called out in a sultry tone. “Keene, don’t you think you were a bit harsh on them?”
I pause and turn to the voice. I know who it belongs to—a one-night mistake.
“Your office,” I growl, my foul mood turning rancid.
I see her lips tip up slightly before she turns and walks away, swaying her hips slightly. One time, I made the mistake of paying too much attention to those hips and what they had to offer. Our encounter wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t worth a repeat. It sure as fuck doesn’t give her the right to question decisions I make for my company. Only Caleb has the right to do that, and that’s because he co-owns Hudson with me.
Once I close Melody’s office door, I turn, and her body is practically pressing against mine, forcing me back. Through clenched teeth, I grit out, “Step away.”
