24
SAVANNAH
Wednesday evening, I had the entire HEAT building to myself. Sam had flown back to Chicago after last night’s team dinner, Kat was on her way home to Gage and the cats, Logan apparently lived nearby and had left for the night, and Ben, Wheeler, and Bloom were going out for karaoke. Ben was not apprised of that last fact, and while I would have paid good money to see his teammates get him up on stage, I thought he could use some guy time, and I could use a few hours to myself.
I’d lived alone for six years, less the six months I’d come home to stay with my mom at the end of her life, so I was good at entertaining myself. I slipped into shorts pajamas at 7:00 p.m. and stopped by the kitchen for snacks. I carried chips, pretzels, and chocolate to the lounge and picked up the remote for the big-screen TV.
Out in the gym, there was a series of clicks as someone punched in the cipher code for the outer door. I hugged the remote to my chest and sat still, listening for evidence of whether the person trying to get in was friend or foe. This was the most secure building in town, but after what I’d gone through the past three weeks, my fear meter tacked high at the slightest provocation.
“Hi, Savvy. Are you downstairs?”
“Mai?” I went to the lounge doorway. “What are you doing here?” Suspicion dawned on me. “Did Ben send you to babysit me?”
She hung up her black overcoat inside the front door. “I haven’t spoken to Ben since last night.”
“Kat, then?”
Mai walked across the gym. “I come bearing a peace offering.” When she reached the lounge, she held up two bottles of wine. “Red or white? And we can start with one and move to the other.”
“Not for me. I have an early morning.” I sat back down on the sofa. I didn’t invite her to join me, but since I didn’t own the place, I also couldn’t stop her.
She plopped down a few feet away from me and set the bottles on the coffee table. “What’s going on early tomorrow morning? The operation is still Friday, isn’t it?”
“If you must know, I have a business call scheduled with a potential investor. If I can ever clean up the mess Devlin made, I’ll need an infusion of capital to get the company back on its feet.” That was more than I’d intended to tell her, but I’d spent so many years sharing all—well, most—of my secrets with her, so it all came tumbling out out of habit.
“That’s great news. Are you sure we can’t drink a toast?”
“I’ll pass.” I pulled a pillow out from behind me and clutched it in my lap. I plucked at the fringes on it. I shouldn’t ask what I really wanted to know. I should stay out of other’s family business. But this was Ben.
“Spit it out, Savvy.”
I glanced at Mai.
“I’ve known you for too many years not to know the signs. You have something you want to say to me, so say it.”
“You don’t really know that much about me anymore, though.”
She turned toward me and sat cross-legged on the sofa. “You’re right, and that’s on me. Life got busy. It seemed like we were never home at the same time, and it seemed like no time before I was out of college and in basic. But I’ve missed you, Savvy. I’ve always missed you. I feel like I’ve texted you books about my life. At least, the parts I was allowed to share. But you’ve barely told me anything about your life. I want to know. Tell me everything.”
I wanted her to know. I wanted her to be proud of me. “Well, you know about my business. Our company supports several local charities, which mostly means we write some checks and get invited to their fancy parties. I own a great condo, a nice car, and a closetful of shoes. Not going to lie, I miss my closet and my shoes. I…” I stopped. That was it. The sum total of everything I’d done, accomplished, and bought in the years since I’d left Maryland. “I have a few close friends I see a couple of times a week who keep me sane. And you know about my mom.”
She reached out and took my hand. I indulged in the comfort of it for a minute, then pulled away.
“That’s all there is to tell, but if you’re really here to make peace, there’s something you can tell me.”
“I want to make this right. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know, as long as it’s not classified.”
I took a deep breath to gather my courage, then jumped right into the deep end. “Did you really say that about Ben, that you believed he’d cut and run?”
She shook her head. “Never. I don’t know where he got that idea, and if he’d pick up his damn phone, I would tell him that.”
I’d already done some digging, and now I’d caught her in a lie. “I talked to Kyle. He thinks Ben overheard him and Wheeler talking in the car after his fitness test when they thought he was asleep. Ryan told Kyle you asked him to fast-track Ben’s training so he wouldn’t have the chance to run away.”
Her eyes went wide. “He said what? How did…?” She shook her head. “Men can be idiots. I asked Wheeler to fast-track Ben so he could get in the field faster and get a taste of the action. If he had to spend weeks in training, most of which he’s already had, he would have been bored out of his skull, and then he would’ve...” Her voice tapered off and she looked at me. “I guess I expected him to cut and run. Shit.” She covered her face with her hand. “I didn’t mean to hurt him, Savvy. I didn’t even think about what I was saying.
“I know.” I believed her. My best friend had never been cruel. And she wasn’t wrong about Ben being a man of action. “It wasn’t only you he was hearing in those words, though.”
“My dad. I get that. Fathers and sons have their own issues, I guess.” She laid her hand on my arm. “You know I love my brother. I think he’s amazing. I’ll apologize, maybe remind him how proud I am of the man he’s grown up to be.”
