Page 100 of Worth the Risk

It never made sense that he would not want her in his life. My life, yes—he thought I betrayed him—but I know now he would have been there for her. What I just witnessed was not how a man acts who knew about his daughter and wanted nothing to do with her. Seeing his reaction to her for the first time was surreal. I want them to have a relationship. Not for me, but for Riley. She deserves to have her father in her life.

“I see that now. I just don’t understand how and where this went wrong.”

“Neither do I, but I’ll find out. You better fucking believe that,” he assures me.

I hesitantly ask, “Could this have been Amber?” His answer could go either way. Amber is his friend, so is he willing to listen to me about my thoughts on her?

He rubs his finger on his chin before he responds. “I don’t know, but I do know that you weren’t wrong in your email about her feelings for me. A couple of months after I left, she came onto me and told me she loves me. Since that night, she’s continued. I avoid her now, but with our families being close, I can’t always stay completely away from her.”

She came onto him? He said since that night. Did he sleep with her? Do I even want to know?

“We have a lot to discuss,” I say.

He nods in agreement. “We do. Can we meet for dinner tomorrow night?”

“Yes. But I’ll not discuss this in front of Riley. She doesn’t need to hear this.”

“Of course not,” he agrees readily. “I’ll text you a time. There’s an Italian restaurant down the block. We will meet there.”

That won’t work. “You can’t text me, Leo.”

“Why not?” he asks, seeming put off by that.

“You seem to have forgotten you have my number blocked,” I quip.

His expression is sheepish for a moment. “I’ll fix that.” More to himself, he adds, “It made sense at the time.”

There’s a part of me that wants to comfort him, but that’s not a good idea. Although he believes I betrayed him, he still hurt me. It will take some time to get past the hurt we caused each other.

Focusing on me again, Leo scans my body, and my body tingles from his assessment. The same attraction that’s always been there between us is still there. I feel it deep into my bones, and it causes a shiver to run through me. I saw him checking out my breasts when he first arrived as well. He always had a thing for them.

He runs his fingers through his hair and says, “I’m going to leave now. But as I said, I’ll text you.” He looks like he wants to be anywhere in the world than here with me, so I nod as he shifts on his feet and leaves.

Where will we go from here?For years, it was easy to be mad and hold on to the hate I felt for him when he discarded Riley. But what I learned tonight showed me that wasn’t true. How do we move forward? Riley has now met him, and if he wants to be involved in her life, who am I to take that away from either of them? The problem is that man still does wild things to me. And if I don’t have that hate as a force field between us, what will stop us from acting on the attraction that’s clearly still between us?

* * *

Riley is asleep in her room, and Sierra and I are sitting at her kitchen table. I told her everything that happened with Leo, then gave Mom a quick rundown of events earlier tonight when we were in the bathroom at the restaurant. She only advised me to be smart about what I do and that I must remember to do what is best for Riley.

“I still have anger, but it’s now misplaced where Riley is concerned. I want to know how everything happened. No matter how many times I go over it in my head, I’m convinced Amber is somehow involved. My thoughts are biased where she’s concerned, but I still believe she had something to do with this.”

“I understand why you’d feel that way. If she’s capable of drugging you and Nash, who knows what lines she’ll cross or has already crossed?”

What lines she has crossed that we don’t know about is worrying to think about.

“Leo knows she wants him. He said a couple of months after he left me, she came onto him. She told him she loves him.”

“Do you think they slept together?”

I shiver. That is one thing I don’t want to think about. I would hope not.

“I don’t know. He told me he stays away from her now as much as possible. I think she’s obsessed with him. If she drugged us, she’d do anything to have him. I just can’t understand how she pulled off sending me a million dollars and how she would be involved in the emails.”

“Doesn’t her father work for Knight Industries? Do you think he may have helped her? It would have been easy for him to access emails and move money as their CFO.”

Shit. Could he be as warped as Amber? Or is she as warped as him?This is something I’ll have to talk with Leo about.

My phone dings with a text.

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