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“Is that why you went to college early?” he asks quietly.
“Sort of.” I rest my face against his chest, oddly soothed by the smell of his soap, the feel of him there. “My father went back to court and won custody, just to punish her. My mom would have let me live with him full time if I’d wanted it. She’d have gone out of her way to make me feel like it was okay. He just did it to prove he could.”
I really can’t believe, after everything he’s done, and after everything I suffered to defy him, that he might win all this in the end anyway.
“I’m so sorry,” he says.
I shake my head. “What you went through is so much worse, yet somehow I’m the only one of us who hasn’t recovered.”
He laughs unhappily. “Drew thinks I haven’t recovered either, if it makes you feel any better.”
“Oh?”
“She says I only date women I can’t care about because I’m scared of getting attached to someone. She’s probably got a point.”
It feels like a knife to the heart. I never wanted him to care about me, but it hurts anyway. I sit up and set my wine carefully on the table, needing distance. “That’s the kind of thing you should probably keep to yourself when you’re with a female.”
He pulls me against him before I can rise. “Gemma,” he says with a quiet laugh, “I would have kept it to myself if you were one of them.”
I look up, studying his face. His eyes are soft and sincere. I want to believe him. I really do.
“How can you not already know that?” he asks as he presses his lips to the top of my head.
Because you never know. You never know until it’s too late. I’m starting to think Ben might be different, though, and that’s terrifying in its own way.
36
Ben and I are at the office late the following Tuesday, comparing the expense reports Fiducia provided us against the receipts acquired from the strip clubs. If they falsified reports, we can have them charged with fraud. But we will also need to somehow prove these were company-sanctioned events, not one or two rogue employees billing the company for their shady extracurricular activities.
We’re sitting at the table in his office in front of a mountain of expense reports when my mother calls.
“Hi, Mom,” I say, with a cautious glance at Ben. I haven’t told her about him, and don’t really want to. She’d just get her hopes up.
“Derek is married,” she says, before I ask if I can call her later.
“Who’s Derek?”
“The neurosurgeon on Grey’s Anatomy. Poor Meredith finally gives him a chance and then his wife shows up. Can you believe it?”
I laugh. “Mom, I haven’t seen it, so yes, I can believe almost anything Meredith and Derek do. I thought we were talking about real people. How’s everything else? You’re home kind of early.”
“Ed, my boss, made me leave. He was worried about my car making it down the hill—we’re supposed to get freezing rain tonight.”
My chest tightens. “Did you salt the walkway? Because you know that asshole apartment manager isn’t going to do it.”
She sighs. “I hadn’t even heard about the rain ’til Ed told me, so I don’t have any salt yet.”
I climb from my seat and head for my laptop, still sitting on the chair by Ben’s door. “I’ll call the front desk. They’re liable for any injuries that take place on their property if they can’t show they took proper precautions.”
“Gemma, don’t. Suzy in the main office has hated me ever since you called last year. She won’t even tell me when I get a package now.”
My fists clench. “Document it, Mom,” I growl. “Document everything she’s done. She doesn’t get to treat you like that.”
I can hear the rage in my voice. It’s the sort that would turn to tears as soon as I hang up the call, if Ben wasn’t here to witness it.
“Honey, stop. You’re just going to make things worse. I don’t want Suzy to get fired. She’s doing her best, and she’s got problems of her own.”
Stop being so forgiving, I want to scream. Stop letting people walk on you. And stop assuming the best of others when no one will extend that same courtesy to you. I’m angry at her. I’m angry on her behalf. I’m so angry, and I’m so tired of being angry all the time. Maybe I wouldn’t have to be if I accepted my father’s offer—but then I’d be angry about other things instead.
