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A sense of unease tugged at my gut. “What do you mean?” I asked carefully.Please tell me this isn't leading where I think it is.
He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Well, to start, he had a lock of my hair wrapped around a green lollipop that he kept in the top drawer of his desk at work. It was wet when we found it.”
I gaped. “What?”
“Tip of the iceberg.”
My stomach churned. “What the fuck.”
“He'd taken hundreds of photos of me without my consent or knowledge, kept prints of them in the dashboard of his company-issued car. We found stolen pocket squares, drawings of me, handwritten letters that were incredibly uncomfortable to read, and he'd…. he’d very clearly made a habit of going through my trash. In my apartment. That I’d never given him the keys to. Think used condoms, floss, tissues.”
I was speechless. Creeped the fuck out, and utterly speechless.
“I'd never suspected anything,” Adrien went on. “He seemed like a normal guy, and he was good at his job. I trusted him. But then my phone started to blow up, and the same people were showing up everywhere I went. Airports, restaurants, my apartment building, my running route. A leaked phone number is one thing, but I didn't understand how they were getting their hands on my schedule. Turned out, Keaton had been sharing my information with a small group of people on that forum for well over a year. But it had remained contained to their private chat until one of them decided to leak it. It happened after they'd had an argument.”
My mouth was still hanging open. “That's... insane. I'm so sorry.”
“I was still dealing with the aftermath of it when I hired Alba, both logistically and emotionally. And since we were trying to keep the story out of the media, the information was distributed on a need-to-know basis only. So, your sister doesn't know what happened. Just that I had her sign a bunch of NDAs and made sure she knew how much I valued my privacy. She had limited access to my schedule and personal information, and she wasn't allowed to ask questions about my personal life. In return, I wouldn't ask about hers.”
Bit by bit, his behavior started to make sense. No wonder he wouldn't give me his phone number. I picked up another strawberry and bit into it, thinking. “I can’t imagine working with someone for four years and never breaking that seal. But, I mean, I get it. That's a really traumatizing experience.”
“It broke once,” he said, eyes darting down to my lips as I popped the rest of the strawberry into my mouth. “Alba was the one that caught Mandy cheating.”
My chewing slowed, my fingers going still around the grape I'd reached for. She'd cheated on him?
His eyes met mine, searching. “Alba really never did tell you, did she?”
I shook my head. My sister was excellent at keeping secrets, so that part wasn't surprising. “She said you owed her a favor, was that it?” I asked. She'd informed him of the affair, and kept quiet about it afterward, so he'd owed her one?
A nod.
“And the guy that Mandy's marrying... it's not the same person she cheated on you with, is it?”
He rolled his lips. “My cousin. It started shortly after the whole Keaton thing happened—that's actually how they met. She was on our PR team; he was the lawyer taking care of my sealed restraining order. It was happening right under my nose for a little over three years, and once again, I'd had no idea. I proposed, thinking—” He cut off, color sprinting to the tips of his ears, his temples.
What the fuck?
My head had jutted forward, my mouth hanging open again. “She cheated on you with your cousin and they're both coming to your parents’ anniversary party? They wereinvitedto your parents’ anniversary party?”
“It was a long time ago,” he responded gruffly, his jaw tight. “And they've apologized.”
“So?” There was some shit people didn't deserve to be forgiven for. This was pretty high on that list. “Please tell me you have some elaborate revenge scheme planned. If you've brought me here because you think it'll piss her off, I'm officially in. Let's do it. Give me the ring, and I'll—”
“They announced it on Halloween.”
My heart hurled itself against my ribs, a shot of adrenaline spiking through my bloodstream.
“Their engagement,” he clarified before I could ask. “Alice texted me fifteen minutes before I greeted the investors in our hotel lobby.”
“ThisHalloween?” My voice cracked. “Right before I...” Right before I'd assaulted him, cost him a shit ton of investment dollars, and ran away? “Shit. Adrien, I’m so sorry, I—”
“Why did you do it?”
I almost didn't want to say it, because it didn't excuse my actions the way I'd originally allowed myself to justify. Suddenly, picking glitter out of dirt didn't seem to be enough of a punishment for how I'd acted.
“I told you, this guy in a blue suit grabbed me, and I thought it was—”
He shook his head, leaning closer. “No. Why did you smash his car window?”
