Page 25 of Broken Daddy

I can’t lose everything. I have Eva to consider.

Self-preservation and logic take over. I take a deep breath.

“Sorry, Scott. You’re right. It’s just a hard pill to swallow.”

“I know. I don’t like it, either. But we have all the proof we need. We can file a police report this week and be truthful if he tries to gain employment elsewhere and they reach out.”

My phone beeps, letting me know there’s another call coming in. I hold it away and see Gen’s full name on the screen:Genevieve Walker.

Odd. She hasn’t called me once the whole two and a half weeks she’s worked for me.

“Can you let me know by end of day tomorrow what the next steps are?”

“Of course, Nate. Let me talk with the team—”

Another beep. Insistent.

I frown.

“Scott, I’m sorry, I have another call coming through. Thank you again for this. We’ll touch base later?”

I tap the icon to end the call with my company’s head lawyer and switch over to Gen’s. The urgency in her voice has me moving for the door immediately.

“—vandalized the door, it’s got an actualholein it—”

“Genevieve, slow down. Start over. What happened?”

Her words come out as a breathy gasp. “I stopped by my apartment quick to pick up a few things. No one’s here, but it’s vandalized.”

“Don’t you have someone subletting? Maybe they just had an accident, or—”

“No. They’re here. They told me it happened this morning, a little after midnight. Nate, the girl who’s subletting is leaving. Right now. She doesn’t feel safe here and—”

“Okay. Listen, stay there. I’m going to come check it out.” Sensing the hesitance from her end of the line, I add, “Go wait in your car. And send me the address.”

Before my call with Scott, I’d been planning on heading into the office for the day. My jacket waits on the back of a chair. I ignore it.

Something in me is stirring.

I want—no,need—to protect Gen from whatever it is that’s happening right now.

That fear in her voice…it’s like I’m finally waking up after years of being blind to the world around me.

On the way out the door, I grab Eva’s baseball bat. She’s over at a friend’s house for the afternoon and won’t miss it.

* * *

Thirty minutes later,I pull up just down the street from a ten-story red brick building.

How did someone manage to get in here and vandalize Gen’s apartment?

If I’m being honest, it’s nicer than I expected. But then, she’d been on a Michelin star income before the restaurant dropped her. The Alfa Romeo beeps as I lock the doors and head for the main entrance.

I scan the street, taking in the normal foot traffic for New York and a semi-gentrified area.How the hell?There’s even a doorman.

But then, as I approach the alley between buildings, I see it—a side door propped open. Probably for property management or cleaning staff. Maybe a resident sneaks out for a smoke now and then.

Frustration has me shaking my head. It’s an easy, dumb way to be vulnerable, and it’s exposed Gen to some kind of violence.

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