Page 82 of Twisted Assist

“You are not above creating an issue, just so our firm can fix it.”

She didn’t deny my words but tilted her head and beaded her eyes. “Not at the expense of my employees.”

“How was I supposed to know that? How am I supposed to believe that?”

“Fair enough,” she stood up, walking behind her desk. “You didn’t know that, but now you do. So what are we going to do about it?”

“I need to handle it. I’m going to arrange a meeting with the team for tomorrow morning and go over what I know. All I care about is getting Tripp back on that field.”

“A picture is hard to deny.”

“No one cares about that picture, Sophia. It's the drug test that got him kicked off the team, and now that we know he was drugged by someone, we should be able to explain the extenuating circumstances.”

“Maybe you should start by calling the police and reporting the crime.”

“It may come to that, but knowing Tripp, he wouldn’t want that. I’m going to let any legal proceedings be his call.”

“Then how are you going to prove he was drugged? Because if I was the team owner and coaches, I wouldn’t believe the word of his girlfriend.”

Girlfriend? Was I his girlfriend?

For the sake of keeping things simple, I guess I was, because there was no way I could deny how close we were. Especially since helping him meant telling the truth about everything.

“You have my full support,” Sophia leaned up and started typing on her computer again. “Also, if you check the pictures you uploaded to the drive, it's clear that Hunter Ward was eyeing Tripp a little too hard. Those pictures may help you at least prove Hunter’s role and give credit to Tripp’s side of the story.”

The pictures.

Yes.

Being so focused on looking for something menacing, I never stopped to look for something carnal.

“Thank you,” I breathed, standing up, eager to get to my desk. “I’m sorry, I just…”

“Don’t do it again,” she bit at me, not even giving me a smile or accepting my apology.

Nodding, I excused myself and ran to my desk, spending the rest of the afternoon planning a meeting with the Inferno and getting copies of things I would need. Just after five, I looked up and realized I was once again the only one left in the building, and a shudder came over me.

Checking my phone, I thought I may have a missed call from Tripp or at least a text, but there was nothing other than a picture from Colton of him eating my food and a caption.

Thanks sis!

You’re welcome, you moocher.

You’re never here to eat it. ;-)

True, but I will be tonight. Make me something yummy.

Whoa. Are you coming home? Are things okay with lover boy?

I don’t know. But I want to run something by you. So stay there, I’m headed home.

You have stuff for spaghetti, so come hungry.

Smiling, I was glad he was there and waiting for me to get home. I needed to unload everything on him and see what he thought. See if he agreed that the craziness I was running through my head was actually possible. Because there was only one more person that I could think of who would do something like this. It was the one person so desperate for me to be someone I wasn’t that they’d probably go to great lengths to make it happen.

* * *

“Yo!” Colton yelled when I opened the door to my apartment. It felt like it had been forever since I had been there because so much had happened since I was last home.

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