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“God, I wish Brett had broken him in two.” Lo shook her head.
I shivered, but it had nothing to do with temperature.
She glanced over and then did a double take. “You okay? You want me to turn this off?” She raised the remote. “I’ll change the channel.”
She clicked, but the next one was another news segment, and they were discussing the same incident. She muttered a curse, skimming through more channels, stopping on the sports network, which was also analyzing Brett’s hit at the gas station.
Lo cringed. “Uh… Well, at least they’re not showing your tripping clip. That seems to have finally gone away.”
“Until Dateline does a show on me.”
“Right.” Lo cringed again. “I should try to make friends with hackers.”
She was serious, and I started laughing. After a second, she started in with me, and then we couldn’t stop. There was just so much tension to release. Finally, wiping our eyes, we were able to breathe again.
“I’m sorry about that,” she said.
I swatted at her, chuckling. “Stop. I won’t be able to do any work today.”
She made a face, glancing at my laptop. “How are you working today? I mean…” She thrust a hand toward the television.
“Because I’m not Willow Harm on here. I’m Melanie Morning, and my clients think I have a normal life, which means no kidnapping attempts, no serial-killer fa—shit. I was going to say serial-killer fate, which doesn’t make sense.”
“Fate? You think you coming across the Midwest Butcher was fate?”
My throat burned. I refocused on my screen. “I need to work before something new happens and I really do fall apart.”
Lo jumped to her feet. “This isn’t your fate. This isn’t some destiny shit. You lived. You survived—”
God. I stared at the screen, my throat scalding now.
Lo quieted. “Billie?”
I shook my head, my fingers shaking as I tried to type my password in.
I was denied.
I typed again.
Denied.
The burning sensation was spreading, moving down my chest, my stomach, my legs. I shoved my computer to the side and jumped up, starting to pace.
“Billie.” Lo stood too.
I never fell apart. There were tears some nights, but when I was alone, when no one could hear. That was it. That was all I gave him. This new guy, he would get less than that. I couldn’t control whether my arm would shake, or my fingers, but if I fell apart? I could control that.
“I’m fine,” I said through gritted teeth.
“You can take a day, you know.”
“No, I can’t!” I yelled. “I can’t, and you know it. If I take a day, then he got that day. And he might get another day and another. If he’s watching, he’s never seen me cry because of him. He’s never seen me scared. I won’t let him get off on seeing that power over me. I won’t give it to him.”
Lo’s eyes were focused on my hand, and I looked down to find it completely shaking. Cursing, I tucked it under my arm. “I can’t control that. I—”
“Maybe if you gave yourself a day, your body wouldn’t react like that.”
I stopped, but a surge of dark and nasty anger rose in me. “Fuck you, Lo.”
