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“It’s fine. I’m ready.”
“Are you sure you want to come with me? Are you well enough?”
“I’m good,” he says as I open the driver’s-side door, and he goes over to the passenger side.
“Lyla, wait!” Bear calls out. “Don’t take off like this,” Bear says as he comes down the steps barefoot.
Unfortunately, Thane’s walking so slowly that Bear has time to come to the driver’s window.
The gorgeous man just watched me throw up for half an hour, even held my hair. If I weren’t so angry at him and my…Isaac, I would be mortified.
If he touches me, I might crumble, so I don’t roll the window down when I tell him, “It’s over, Barrett. Now I know why you didn’t want any strings. I went from being a pity fuck to a mission for you to complete. Which is fine,” I add with a raised hand to forestall his objection, “because I never believed it was real for a second.”
“Lyla…”
I crank the engine and turn the radio up to drown out Bear’s voice until Thane finally slips in on the passenger side.
As soon as I back out of the driveway, the teardrops start sliding down my cheeks.
“Did my…did Isaac put you up to staying here, keeping an eye on me?”
“No.”
“If you’re lying…”
“I’m not, okay?”
“Is he the reason you want to come to Atlanta with me?”
“No. I know he’ll worry a little less about you when I tell him I’m with you, but I just…I need to get out of this place for a while.”
“I know what you mean,” I mutter as I reach up to swipe the dampness off my face. “Did you know he wasn’t my biological father?”
“What? Who?”
“Isaac!”
“Hold on. Isaac isn’t your biological father?”
“Nope. The kidnapper…the guy who shot you was.”
“Holy shit,” he replies softly, making me think he’s telling the truth.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Barrett
“You don’t have to keep coming by here, you know,” Isaac grumbles when he stands up from his desk to meet me at the door of his office. “A phone call would take up less of my time and accomplish the same damn thing.”
“I can’t take the chance that you won’t answer my call.” I’m surprised he hasn’t blocked my number yet. That’s what Lyla did within hours of pulling out of my driveway.
“Can’t lie. I’d probably send you to voicemail.”
“That’s what I figured,” I tell him. “Have you heard from her?”
“Not directly, since she’s still pissed at me, thanks to your big mouth, but Thane says she got the job. She’s staying in Georgia.”
“Goddamn it!” I exclaim, and my fist is suddenly slamming into the wall. I drove down to Atlanta to see her, and that bastard told me Lyla didn’t want to see me again. Guess he was telling the truth, eventhough I didn’t want to hear it. She’s starting a new life in a new town, a new state, one without men in her life…one without me.
