Page 10 of My Fake Billionaire Damaged Boyfriend

He looks uneasy for a moment before bringing back his laptop and setting it on my lap. Lifting the screen up, he shows me the odd page of information that comes spiraling over the monitor. I can’t help but be slightly offended by the sight.

“You looked me up? Why?”

“Because I wanted to know more about you, Kitten. It was important for me to understand a few things.”

“What do you mean,a few things?”

Uneasy, he runs a hand through his stiff hair, and it seems to loosen the gel slightly. “I wanted to know how good you were at code and this article pulled up about your parents, so I opened it and—”

“No,” I gust, pushing the laptop aside. “I don’t want to talk about them. Not right now, and not with you.”

“Understood, Kitten. I get that.”

Looking around this pretty penthouse, I inhale a shaky breath and surrender. I kick the blanket off and retreat to the bedroom, pulling the covers back so I can climb into bed. I face the desk that still has the monitor on, the line of suspicious code still highlighted.

I know it’s nothing good, but I don’t have the guts to look at it.

Fear fills my chest where humiliation once ran free in my soul. Settling in the softest bed in the world, I retrace every line of code in my head over and over again, picturing the numbers and lines of text that make up this software. It’s for people to buy and protect themselves with; but I don’t even feel secure in my own abilities to hack through the rather simple format.

If I’m wrong, I lose my job in the first week and return home a failure. I can’t let that happen, and I can’t let some prissy rich rival of my boss tell me who I am. My parents are the reason I was able to take online classes in tech and coding.

If not for their abandonment, and the community rallying around me in pity, then I wouldn’t be here.

The last thing I want is for Dimitri to know any of that but it’s too late now.

He sees me for who I am. The woman too afraid of opening the hazardous link of code in Alek’s software.

The woman new to Seattle and not good with gin.

The woman whose parents couldn’t give a damn about her, only to be left with their assets and their debt.

CHAPTER5

Izzy

It’s been a few days at work, and this secret is tearing me apart. Sitting in my leather chair, my legs bounce nervously under the desk. It’s almost the weekend in an hour and I go home, only to think about this anomaly further like I have been for days. I scroll over the text, watch the gateway ask to open up, but I don’t click on it yet.

I want to know where it goes, why it is in here, but I don’t want to lose my job.

Alek comes to my office doorway and flicks his thick fingers in the air to signal for me to follow. I exit out of the code at once, worried he could see it in my window’s reflection behind me. I hurry to catch up to him in his office now, watching him sit behind the desk while a familiar face is perched on the chair nearby.

“Izzy, you remember Dimitri Wilde, right?”

I nod at the odd interdiction to the man I met many days ago. I have seen him around here a few times talking to Alek, and I’m worried that he’s here now to spill my secret about the gateway I’ve found. Still, I nod in pleasantries and take a seat next to Dimitri, Alek making it a point to shut the door so he can come around the desk and take his place.

“I bet you two are wondering why I’ve called you into my office this afternoon.”

“Have me stumped,” Dimitri says, calm and collected.

“Have I done something wrong?” I ask, a little concerned, Alek’s eyes poking me with more holes than Dimitri did when we first met.

“You do good work, Izzy. My team says you’ve been very helpful in organizing tasks and keeping a watch on my software. I just have more of a personal quarrel with the two of you.”

“What else is new?” Dimitri asks, taunting my boss slightly. “We always have issues. Why is she here, too?”

“Because I’ve heard whispers about you two, and I want to be sure they’re false.”

“What kind of whispers?” I ask.

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