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“We both were. We need to let her know that. But you’re right; maybe it’s best if you give her some time.”
“Yeah.”
“In the meantime, you need to stop beating yourself up for not realizing that guy was committing crimes.”
“Right under my nose, Henry.”
“Yeah, I know that. But how long did Sergeant Bracco realize that Murray wasn’t doing all the push-ups he was supposed to do? And that was just basic training, not criminal activity. Of course, your people were hesitant to blow the whistle on this, even if they thought something suspicious was happening. And you wouldn’t have wanted to see it.”
“It’s my job to see it. I should have seen it.”
“I’m just saying, cut yourself a little slack. It got noticed in the end, and everything is going to be straightened out now. That’s what matters, isn’t it?”
“I suppose it is.”
“All right. Don’t make me come over there and make soup for you too.”
“Are you making soup for Alison?”
“She’s been staying with me, yeah.”
Fuck. I hadn’t realized it was so bad that she’d needed to go home and stay with her father. I must have really hurt her. She must be fucked up.
A phone call wasn’t going to be enough to make this right. I felt sick about the way I’d treated her. She had come into my office trying to do a job. She’d gotten locked in here by one of my men—she didn’t even know yet that that hadn’t been the fluke we’d thought it was. I had persisted in hitting on her—I could acknowledge now that I’d been the one making most of those overtures. And when she’d given in to my advances, I had slut-shamed her for it.
God, what a dick I’d been.
And the worst part was that I’d done it to someone I liked. She had never just been a hot young thing to me. It had always been more. She challenged me. I’d liked matching wits with her, even when I’d thought of her as my enemy.
How would it have been if we had ever gotten to the point of admitting we actually liked each other?
It could have been the best relationship of my life. I would never have expected a relationship with Alison Barrett, but now, hell, I didn’t think I’d ever find another woman like her. Not if I searched the entire world.
And I had fucked it up because I hadn’t been willing to see the truth about corruption in my department.
“I’ll tell you what,” I told Henry. “Will you let me know when she goes home?”
“Why?”
I wanted to visit her at her house, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. “That’s how I’ll know she’s ready to hear from me,” I said. “If she’s staying at your house, she probably isn’t going to want to hear anything I have to say. At least, not right now.”
“She accepted my apology pretty easily. I’m sure she’ll accept yours.”
“Well, I hope so.”
“Just make sure you handle that quickly,” Henry said warningly. “I don’t want Alison moping around for the next month. She needs to know that she didn’t do anything wrong here. We were the ones in the wrong for the way we reacted.”
“You’re right,” I agreed. “I’ll speak to Alison soon.”
But honestly, I didn’t know whether or not that was true. The idea of trying to reach out to Alison after everything that had happened was extremely intimidating. She deserved it—but it would be a hell of a lot easier to just walk away.
That’s what I’d always done in the past when things had gotten complicated with women.
Was it just the fact that she was my best friend’s daughter that had me feeling differently this time?
I didn’t think so, somehow.
I left the office early that day, something I seldom did. My big Georgetown home had always been a refuge in the past, but today it felt impossible to fill. What had I thought when I bought this place? This was a home for a family, not for one lonely guy. Most days, I didn’t even enter most of the rooms.
