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I wanted to give that sweet, sexy man the world. But he was a multimillion-dollar movie star who was used to having everything he wanted, right? A bouquet of flowers or a candlelight dinner would seem… trite compared to the things he’d probably gotten from other lovers.
Are you trying to woo him now? What is this?
I rinsed and wrung out the cloth before turning off the water. Maybe not woo him, but I wanted to give him something to let him know the vulnerability wasn’t one-sided. He’d let me see a tender side of him, and he deserved to see the same from me.
As soon as I walked back into the bedroom and saw him there, I realized one thing I could give him.
12
Finn
Declan looked different when he came back into the bedroom. Determined.
“You asked me why I left LA,” he said, reaching out to run a hot cloth over my body with gentle strokes. “And I kind of… avoided answering.”
“You shut down tighter than a stiff screen door.”
I watched him return the cloth to the bathroom before joining me in bed again. My body still felt languid and easy from the orgasm, but his words woke me up.
“I don’t like to talk about it,” he said, as if that hadn’t been obvious. “And part of me assumed you probably already knew why.”
“Why would I know why you’d moved to Aster Valley? I’ve known you less than a week.” It didn’t make any sense. “And every time I’ve asked you, you’ve bolted.”
He sighed. For some reason the implication I should have already known about it made me feel jittery and nervous, like I’d somehow been involved in a situation I was completely unfamiliar with.
“I thought maybe you’d googled it. People do,” he said wryly. “I was a witness in the department bribery scandal. I’m sure you heard about it. My ex-partner was involved.”
I lifted my head up to look at him. “Partner as in…”
He shook his head. “Partner on the force. Not lover. Nick turned out to be one of the officers who’d accepted bribes from high-profile… people… in exchange for not charging them for crimes.”
I sat up. “You’re kidding? He let people bribe him out of charges? What kind of cop does that?”
Declan’s forehead crinkled in confusion. He sat up, too, and pulled the bedcovers over him as if he didn’t want to be naked for this conversation. “The corrupt kind. The kind who think justice only applies to poor people. The kind who cater to…” He met my eyes and clamped his lips together before saying, people like you.
I felt my heart rate tick up. “I didn’t hear about it.” And that was the truth. “When did it happen?”
He looked like he didn’t believe me. “New Year’s. Several house parties were busted for drugs. When no charges came from all the police activity, Internal Affairs did an investigation. Now does it ring a bell?”
Now his tone was straight-up disbelieving, and I felt like I was being accused of something. “No, why… why would I know about something that happened while I was out of the country? I don’t understand. You’re acting like I had something to do with you losing your job.”
“You weren’t out of the country on New Year’s. Yours was one of the house parties busted.”
I stared at him. Now it was my turn to look incredulous. “Are you fucking kidding me? I was in England. For six weeks working on… working on my graduate degree.”
He was the first person I’d told outside of Franklin and the students and professors in Stratford. It was my secret indulgence, something I feared being judged for if the world discovered silly Chip Clover fancied himself a student of something serious.
Declan still looked suspicious. “Why do you sound like you’re making that up?”
“Because no one knows about it, dammit! Because it’s my little secret. The treasure of my fucking heart. So go ahead and make fun of me, okay? I snuck off to Stratford-on-Avon to study the bard and told everyone I was vacationing on a private island.”
His eyes widened in surprise. “Why wouldn’t you tell anyone you were taking Shakespeare classes? Wouldn’t that be seen as a boost to your resume or whatever an actor calls it?”
I let out an ugly laugh. “No. Not me. People would think I was a joke.”
Now Declan’s face was as stormy as the weather outside. “You’re not a fucking joke. But at least that explains your alibi was legit.”
“Alibi for what? What are you talking about?”
“One of the New Year’s parties we busted was at your house in Santa Monica. There was extensive drug use, property damage to a neighbor’s house, and one instance of a guest driving drunk. No charges were made, and it was discovered that responding officers had accepted a large cash payment from someone claiming to be your representative.”
