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“Right.” Her face was impassive, a trick she’d mastered when our parents had still been alive, when she’d been lying to them about the parties she was going to and the bad boys she was dating. “He’s been great.”
“How great?”
Her facial expression didn’t budge. “Great in an ex-Marine, bulging-muscle, will-kill-someone-if-they-look-at-me-cross-eyed sort of way. He makes me feel safe.”
“Does he make you feel anything else?”
Hannah scowled at me and picked up part of her hair, twirling it. “He’s nice. How’s Gabe? How’s he handling the fact that you’ve got to work nonstop for the near future? I’m guessing he’s disappointed. Or maybe he’s upstairs in your office, refusing to let you disappoint him?”
“He’s at work. He’s…not happy with me right now.”
Hannah looked annoyed. “What’d you do?”
“Nothing,” I said defensively. “I just told him I needed to be here.”
“He’s the CEO of a multibillion-dollar corporation too. I’m sure he understands the pressure you’re under.”
I shrugged. “He does.”
“So what’s the problem?” Hannah leaned forward, her full focus on me. “Tell me.”
I bit my lip and watched the carpet.
“Lauren.”
I finally looked up. “Clive Warren sold my stolen specs to a foreign corporation. They’re trying to reverse-engineer the technology based on the faulty information he sold them. They’re the origin of the threat I told you about,” I said, even though that wasn’t the problem we were talking about.
“What?” Hannah’s voice reached a near-hysterical pitch. “Who the hell is it?”
“We believe it’s a Chinese biomedical company—Jiàn Innovations.”
She nodded slowly. “I know who they are. A couple of their apps became hot commodities last year. Why are they stealing from us?”
“They want my technology, and they can’t seem to make it themselves.”
Hannah looked appalled. “Jesus, Lauren.”
I went back to inspecting the carpet. “Now you sound like Gabe.” Because even though we were discussing the Chinese company who’d stolen from me and was threatening me, Gabe was all I could think about.
“What happened with him?” I could feel her watching me. “Did you push him away? Did you tell him that you could handle everything all by yourself?”
“No. I just told him I thought he’d be safer if he stayed away from me right now, and he didn’t want to hear it.”
Hannah groaned. “You always isolate yourself. You’ve done it your whole life, and it’s gotten toxic since Mom and Dad died. Gabe cares about you, and he’s capable of helping you. He can help protect you. The last thing you need to do is cut him off right now.”
“But I’m not cutting him off. I explained that to him, but he’s so freaking stubborn, he wouldn’t listen.”
She grunted. “He’s stubborn?”
“I don’t want them to take him away from me. I couldn’t stand it.”
Hannah got up and came over to me. “I know it’s scary to have feelings for someone. Hey. Look at me.”
I looked up at her. “What?”
“It is scary to love somebody. Because you could lose them, or they could decide they don’t love you back, or they could die in a car accident. Loving somebody is a risk, and you can’t make it a calculated risk, because it’s not scientific. I’m sure that scares the shit out of you.”
“I’m not scared to have feelings for Gabe. I’m scared that the people who bought my technology off the black market are going to come after him. If something happens to him and it’s my fault, I’ll never forgive myself. Do you understand?”
