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I held my breath while Vanessa processed what I’d just blurted out.
A flurry of emotions crossed her face. Horror. Fear. Sadness. Anger. Shock. More sadness. She sat up and slid away from me, her gaze pinned to mine.
“How long have you known?”
I couldn’t lie to her, not by omission. Not at all. “I was with the guys when the call came in. The day I drove you home from Kat’s place.”
Her blue eyes went wide and she shook her head in disbelief.
“Okay. I understand why you didn’t tell me at first, maybe you thought I didn’t need to know. But now, Emmett? After everything that’s happened, you still kept it from me?”
With every shake of her head, I could see Vanessa growing further and further away from me. “I can’t believe you’d do that.”
“I wanted to tell you that day, I really did. But I couldn’t.”
“Because you were ordered not to?”
Even as she asked the question, Vanessa went around my bedroom and picked up her panties and bra, putting them on in sharp, jerky moves.
“Yeah. Let me explain.”
“Dammit, Emmett,” she growled and shook her head as she yanked her jeans off the floor. “I’m done with men keeping secrets. Lance had way too many secrets. Where he went, what he was up to when he left the house. And then he shows up dead. I swore to myself I’d never go through it again. Apparently, it’s a lesson I need to learn again.”
“Vanessa, you seemed so happy with the job, and I didn’t want to be the one to take that from you. Not after everything you’ve been through. And Jasper still doesn’t even know who did it. Or why.”
“I’m not talking about them, Emmett! This is about you, the man I trusted. You lied to me, not them.”
And here I was still lying to her. Was I going to admit my brother had ordered me to keep silent?
“I only wanted to keep you safe, Vanessa. You mean the world to me.”
“Yeah, I’m sure I do,” she grunted and reached for the torn blouse I’d ripped off her body last night. “Just not enough for you to be honest with me. To trust me with your precious family secrets. At least now I know where I stand.”
I got up from the bed, pleading, “Vanessa, you have to stay. You’re not safe out there.”
Before I reached her side, she said, “I’m not safe here, either. Goodbye, Emmett.”
I couldn’t move. I was frozen in the middle of the room as she stomped down the steps. I walked to the top of the stairs and saw her pause only to put on her sexy high heeled boots and grab her purse. Moments later, the purr of her engine sounded before it slowly—too fucking slowly—faded.
I was angry as hell. Pissed off but mostly at myself. Vanessa was right; I should have told her the truth as soon as things changed between us and that was on me. I couldn’t blame Terry or Jasper or anyone else. It was all on me.
And now that my place was full of Vanessa, her smile and her scent, I couldn’t stay here. I grabbed a hot shower and changed into my gray sweats before heading to House of Ashby to give my body a good, hard, punishing workout. It was the only way I’d be able to sleep tonight, to forget the look of betrayal in her eyes. The goodbye that levelled me with the permanency I heard.
For the first time in a long damn time, I skipped Sunday dinner at Ashby Manor.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Vanessa
I pulled up in front of my house, almost blind from the tears burning my eyes.
I hated crying. It never solved any problems, and only left me wallowing in sadness, which delayed finding solutions to the problem. Unfortunately, I didn’t know how to solve the problem of Emmett lying to me, keeping things from me. Yeah, sure, it was a lie of omission, but it was still a damned lie.
Driving back from Emmet’s had taken the last of my energy. I fell back against the seat and tried to take it all in. Fiona had been murdered. Her tongue cut out of her mouth. How fucking gruesome was that? And still, no one, not Provo who called himself a friend, not Hulu or Evan or Mace. Not Jasper and certainly not Emmett. None of them had bothered to tell me the girl I’d replaced had left her job to go on a permanent vacation.
“Shit.” I just realized that Kat must have known too when she asked me to fill in.
Everyone but me knew and no one had said a Goddamn thing.
As if trying to get away from it all, I snatched up my purse and all but leaped from my car, eager to get into the house and under a hot shower to wash away the Ashbys and all they represented.
