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She didn’t wait to find out what he was going to say. She hung up.
* * *
Tione could tellsomething was wrong the minute he got back from running the dogs. Megan was sitting on his porch, cheeks flushed, eyes wild. She stood as he approached, and her hand trembled as she tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. When she spoke, she wouldn’t look him in the eye.
“What happened in Silicon Valley?”
He froze, one hand on the clip to release Bella, and his blood turned to ice. He could have sworn he’d never told her which part of California he’d lived in. With unsteady movements, he forced himself to unclip each dog, and Trevor bounded away to sniff a clump of grass.
“Tee?” she prodded. “I need to know.”
Wiping his palms on his shorts, he straightened and threw his shoulders back when what he really wanted to do was drop to his knees and beg her not to pursue this line of questioning. To accept him as he was, the way she had been since they met. But even while he wanted that, part of him knew this had been coming all along. It was inevitable. He wasn’t good enough for her, and someone had finally clued her into that fact.
He answered her question with one of his own. “Who have you been talking to?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Mark.”
For a moment, he didn’t understand, but then he realized. Her brother was finally pulling his weight, and doing his bit to protect her. He’d looked into Tione’s past and told her everything. He studied her face anew. Was she disgusted by him? Did she wish she’d never had the misfortune to meet him? His limbs felt heavy, his throat clogged, and his knees wanted to give out. Sighing, he dragged a hand down his face.
“Come in,” he said. “Sounds like you know all about it, anyway.” He led her inside and settled on the stool, letting her take the comfortable chair, and wondering if this would be the last time she’d want to be in the same room as him.
“I need to hear it from you.” Her eyes searched his, seeking reassurance. She wanted him to say it was all a big misunderstanding, but he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t give her what she wanted. Not this time.
“What would be the point?” Whether she heard it from his mouth or someone else’s, the end result would be the same. She was too pure and decent for him—always had been—and now she’d know it.
Her expression took on a hint of desperation. “I want to hear what you have to say.”
He looked at his hands, knowing what she really wanted was for him to maintain the carefully constructed web of lies that made him who he was, but it was time she knew the truth.
“Fine. You want the whole story? Here it is.” He launched into a retelling without pausing to think whether this was what he really wanted to do. The faster the ugliness was over, so he could hide in his cave and lick his wounds, the better. “When I was young, I thought I was a fucking genius. I moved to Silicon Valley with the dream of designing the next big piece of computer software and becoming the Maori version of Steve Jobs. Turns out, I was good, but nothing special compared to all the other aspiring entrepreneurs there.”
Megan paled and glanced around the room. “I thought you hated technology.” Her voice was small. “Your phone doesn’t even have wi-fi.”
“I do hate it,” he said. “Now. The point is, I wasn’t the instant star I expected to be, so while I was developing an app, I signed on to do subcontracted work for a private investigator. I had to pay the bills somehow.”
“Hacking?”
“Yeah.” He swallowed. “Nothing big though. I found evidence of affairs when people were going through divorces, or tracked down embezzlers, that sort of thing. Once my app sold, I didn’t need the extra money anymore, so I quit.”
“It was legal employment?” she asked hopefully. “Within the law because you were working with an investigator?”
He snorted. Of course she’d like to think that. But he wasn’t the hero of this story. Far from it. “Not strictly, no. It was moral, and that’s how I justified it to myself.”
“Oh.”
Yeah,oh. Just wait until she heard what came later.
“The trouble was, I hadn’t realized what a high I got from hacking. I missed it. Even though I didn’t need the money, I struck out on my own, pimped out my services again, but this time without anyone to act as the middleman.” He rubbed his temples and looked at the ground. “I was a dumb shit. I took a job that I thought was like the dozens of others I’d done during acrimonious divorces, but Michele was different. I dug into her life, and couldn’t find any dirty laundry. She was a good person, faithful to her husband—although God knew he didn’t deserve it. She donated to charities and volunteered for a few of them as well, and she was smart. So damn smart.”
Megan stared at him. “It sounds like you…” she trailed off.
“Had feelings for her?” he suggested. “I did. Or at least, I thought I did. The more I learned about her, the more I liked her. I actually started to believe she’d be better off without her husband. He was an ass, and I…” Squeezing his eyes shut, he wished beyond anything that he could go back and correct this mistake. “I considered fabricating evidence of an affair so they’d separate. I didn’t, but I thought about it. How awful is that?”
She didn’t answer.
“In the end, it didn’t matter. I told him she was clean, he accused me of lying—said I was screwing her myself—and then he… he…”
“He killed her,” Megan whispered, her tone full of horror.
