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I close the box and do something I haven’t done in years. I run a finger down the front of the pink spiral notebook. I haven’t read it. Even now, I…I don’t know. I feel like it’s invasive. Or maybe I’m just a coward and I haven’t read it because I’m afraid of what I’ll find in there.
I dumped Lili when I walked in on her fucking my father, and she cried and swore it was going to end. I told her it was too late and… And that was a lie, too.
I’d have forgiven her. I had the fucking ring. I’d have married Lili if she’d lived. Taken her away, never let my ass of a father touch her again. I’m convinced he groomed her. He took advantage of her and her crush on me when she was a kid, fifteen. Way too fucking young and—
I didn’t know.
I should have.
Honestly, I’ve no idea if we’d have worked. She was twenty-one, and I was twenty-six. People change. But even if it ended at some point in the last ten years, Lili would be alive.
I rub a hand over my face and pick it up. I lock up, tucking the notebook under my arm, and I put it in my briefcase, something I only use when I’ve got really crap and above board meetings.
Maybe I’ll read it. Maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll burn it. Or I’ll give it to Jac, whenever he turns up.
Though it’s going to contain things he won’t ever want to know. But what it will do is show I loved her. Lili knew that. We just kept it secret because of the whole family bullshit and she wanted something for her.
She didn’t want my fuck of a father to know.
I shower, dress in a dark gray and rust pin-striped suit. I choose a matching vest, a burnished orange shirt, and a dark gray tie.
Then I head into the office for my eight a.m. meeting.
* * *
It’s around ten, and I’m working when the door to my office bursts open. Jac’s there, in lavender and navy, something only he can pull off and not look like a total fool.
Instead, he looks like what he is: wild, hedonistic and dangerous. He glares as the building’s security rush in after him, all of them scowling. Damon must have let him in.
I look at my phone. Sure enough, there’s a message from Damon. One word.Jac.
No shit.I send back.
I glance at the security who all have their hands on their guns. And with a nod and raised brow, I send them off.
Jac glares at me, at the room, and he’s about to say something, but stops, gaze falling on the pink notebook on top of my desk.
“That’s Lili’s,” he says after a tense moment. There’s surprise in his voice. And pain.
“I’m aware,” I say.
“It’s not yours, Hendrick,” he snaps. “It’s mine. She was my sister.”
He’s hurting. I don’t have to like him to cut him a little slack. “I thought you might want it. But…I’m not sure you should read it.”
Jac snatches it up. “And you have?”
“No. But…”
“You and Lili.” He breathes out.
“She’s written about me. She told me that. I just…” I look at him, swallow. “I loved her, Jac.”
“And your father?”
“I don’t condone what he did. Lili and I never happened until she was eighteen. Jesus, I’m not some fucking creep.”
“I read Agnossio’s disgusting journal you gave me. He wrote like he loved her, or she loved him. It was disgusting. He watched you and Lili? And then…” He makes a sound like a wounded animal.
