Page 6 of Love Me
“If you want someone to blame, blame me,” Knox said. “I’m the one who made Shiloh tell us.”
“How did you even know to make her tell you anything?” Logan argued.
“All I had to do was look at her to know something wasn’t right,” Knox snapped. “Why would someone leave their eighteen-year-old niece behind alone who was clearly going through something she didn’t know how to handle? Almost every night since she moved in next door, we could hear her screaming from her nightmares. Afterward, she would go running before the sun was even up. She’d run for hours like she was running from something that would get her if she stopped. Then we got to know her. We saw the scars she refused to tell us how she got. We saw the way she would react to things with flinches. It became obvious she had been through something violently traumatic. So I began asking questions.Ipushed her to answer because I could see she needed help. Don’t you dare shame her for doing the best she could and failing your expectations. Not when you failed to meet expectations as a parent.”
Logan’s jaw clenched. “Shiloh can’t afford to be reckless.”
“I mean this with the utmost disrespect—fuck you,” Creed seethed.
“Creed,” Keelan admonished, but there was zero oomph in his voice.
Creed shook his head. “I can’t stand this. The more this fucker talks, the more Shi is retreating into herself.”
Everyone glanced in my direction and Keelan’s arm tightened around me.
“Enough,” Ian snapped from where he stood by the door, drawing everyone's attention. Ian looked at Logan. “What’s done is done. She doesn’t want to be relocated and I don’t believe them knowing is a big enough risk to enforce that she be relocated, either. Apart from this sheriff, who we need to handle sooner rather than later, I don’t think she’s compromised here.”
“Do you think the sheriff will discover who she really is?” Knox asked.
Ian shook his head. “I’m sure he’s done a background check. With her being in WITSEC, all the information he’ll find was created for her new identity.”
“Is there a different way he could find who she truly is? Like with her fingerprints or something like that?” Creed asked.
Ian smirked at Logan. “WITSEC goes to extensive lengths to hide those in the program, and if we happened to miss something, well, I’m sure Logan called in a few favors to some old friends to make sure Shiloh’s true identity is unattainable.”
Everyone looked at Logan, who held a schooled expression. “I had her completely erased.”
Ian’s smirk stretched into a smile. “I noticed.”
Logan stared at Ian. “You’re the only one who has her information, the original police reports from the years of him stalking her to the night he murdered our family. I even left you Shi’s hospital records. I know you’re going to need it when we catch him.”
“Is that really why, or is it because Carlos or Eddie couldn’t get past the encryption I have protecting her file?” Ian asked him.
“Eddie can get past anything,” Logan said, admitting which of his ex-Navy SEAL buddies had helped him. “How do you think I knew about the hospital records?”
“What do you mean by completely erased?” Keelan asked.
“It means there’s no record I ever existed,” I answered. “If you were to look up my family online, you would find that Shayla was an only child and that Mr. X was stalking her. News articles that covered the night my family was murdered were altered. Of course, erasing me isn’t completely foolproof because the police involved, the people from my old life who knew me and my family know the truth. Not to mention Shayla was my identical twin.”
“I told you I had all of Shayla’s photos online erased,” Logan said. “The only way for someone to connect you to your parents and sister is if someone tells them.”
With a furrowed brow, Creed looked from Logan to Ian and back to Logan. “Not that I care, but should you really be admitting to doing all that to a fed?”
Logan smirked. “I’m sure Ian’s called in a favor or two.”
“By the time this is all over, you’ll owe me enough to last a lifetime,” Ian said. “Especially with all the felonies I have to look the other way on.”
“Ian and Logan are ex-SEAL buddies,” I told the guys.
Ian’s brows rose. “I thought we were lovers?”
Logan huffed a laugh, then grimaced, clutching his ribs. He stepped around Knox, heading toward the door. “I’m not your type. My hair isn’t blond and my breasts don’t have their own zip code.”
Ian shrugged. “And remind me what your type is? Long legs that spread—”
“I don’t need to hear that information,” I snapped, covering my ears.
As he reached to open the door to leave, Logan glanced back at me, a small smile on his face. For just a moment, all the bad seemed to have been forgotten. But as we locked eyes, it all came back. His smile dropped. “I’m sticking around until we get the shit with the sheriff handled. I know things are rocky right now, but if you ever need me, I’ll come. No matter what, Shi.” He didn’t wait for me to respond and walked out, with Ian following him.
