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“Eventually, I started reading the messages before throwing them away, and then I saved the notes.” Kieran paused for a deep breath. “I tucked them away because no one had gone to such lengths to be with me. My resolve weakened after two months, and we went out on a date that lasted four days. There was part of me that expected Ritchie to move on afterward, so I retreated behind the wall I’d built. He’d knocked down a good chunk of it, but he hadn’t demolished the barrier entirely.”
“But he showed up,” Finley said softly. He slapped his hand over his mouth when he realized he’d spoken his thought out loud. He parted his fingers and added. “Sorry.”
“I’m the one who’s sorry. I should’ve told you all this before I let anything physical happen between us because it gets worse.”
“Worse than imagining the fuck fest you shared with Ritchie?” Finley shook his head. “I doubt it.”
“You’re not emotionally invested in Ritchie, but you are in Cash Sweeney.”
The reminder that his mentor was tangled up in this mess felt like getting doused with water, and a shiver rolled through him. Finley centered himself and said, “I’m ready.”
Kieran peppered him with a few more soft kisses. “If you believe nothing I say today, I want you to believe this next part.” He waited for Finley to nod before continuing. “I have never connected to anyone as swiftly or completely as I did with you. At first, it was physical, and I nearly rubbed the skin off my dick during the first few weeks. I’d gone twenty months without sexual release, and you overwhelmed my circuit boards.” Kieran smiled at Finley’s wide-eyed response to that bomb.Twenty months?Then he recalled Kieran’s remark about having no privacy in jail, and Finley understood the kind of hell that would be for someone as private as him. “But then I got to know you through our quirky conversations,” Kieran continued, “and I observed the real you when you interacted with the horses and ranch crew. You accepted me without conditions or demands.” Kieran swept his thumb over Finley’s mouth and inhaled hard. “That time with you at Dexter’s might’ve been brief, but it was transcendent. Being inside you was the first time I’d ever felt at home. What we shared obliterated anything I’d ever experienced with anyone else, and that’s the part I need you to believe.”
The sincerity in Kieran’s gaze warmed Finley’s heart, but it couldn’t thaw the fear over what Kieran might say next. It would be too easy to transition to “I’ll miss you when I leave” or “I’ll carry our memories wherever I go.” Finley couldn’t stop the inevitable goodbye, only delay it. He wouldn’t ask Kieran for more than he could give, but he would keep his promise to not let him down, so he said, “I believe you.”
“Thank you.” Kieran pressed a quick kiss to his lips before continuing. “Yes, Ritchie showed up at the bar during my next shift and the one after. I practically moved into his place the next weekend, and we made it official within a month. When I wasn’t working at the bar, I hung around his body shop, helping wherever I could, and sometimes that meant moving vehicles to and from the warehouse. I started cutting my shifts at the bar to spend more time with Ritchie. He consumed me and monopolized my time until I turned over everything to him. He reeled me in and pushed me away depending on his mood. It took me going to jail to see how manipulative and controlling he’d been.”
“You had no hint that anything criminal was going on?” Finley asked.
Kieran shook his head. “No. I had Ritchie’s full attention when we were together. Napkin notes became messages on the bathroom mirror or sticky notes on the coffee pot. We took weekend trips to Black Hawk where we gambled, and ate, and—”
Finley held up a hand. “I think I get it.”
“Your jealousy is really cute,” Kieran said. Finley didn’t bother denying it. He gestured for Kieran to keep talking. “Ritchie kept me so busy wallowing in his affection that I didn’t have the time or desire to question his business practices or what he was doing when I wasn’t around.”
“How long did the good times last?”
Kieran leaned back against the loveseat, and Finley followed. He rested his head on Kieran’s shoulder and swung his legs over Kieran’s thighs. “Six months. Maybe seven. Ritchie started taking secret phone calls and putting distance between us. We stopped taking weekend trips. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get us back to where we’d been. The notes stopped, and Ritchie’s disinterest spread everywhere, including the bedroom.” Kieran worked his bottom lip between his teeth, and Finley hated for him to relive the painful memories. But Kieran clearly felt the information was necessary for Finley to understand how they’d arrived at this point. “That’s when I knew something was going on,” Kieran said. “I obviously suspected an affair when we went from sex four or five times a week to Ritchie being unable to keep it up with me. I’d caught him jerking off plenty of times in the shower, which made it clear it wasn’t a medical issue. He’d always tell me he didn’t bottom, yet I caught him riding a dildo. I think he got off on knowing how his rejection fucked with my mind.”
Finley lifted his head. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine how hurtful that was for you.”
“Devastating.” Kieran’s voice was scratchy like he’d yanked the answer from his chest and it had fought him the entire way. “Of course, I blamed myself and tried harder to please him. I’d achieve success occasionally, but it never lasted. I should’ve just packed my shit and left, but I’d had a taste of something wonderful and couldn’t let go. I’d suppressed the addictive personality I’d inherited from my parents until I met Ritchie. I was hooked on him just as strongly as the drugs my parents had injected into their veins or snorted up their noses.”
With his head tucked under Kieran’s chin, he couldn’t see the tears stinging Finley’s eyes. Christ, he had so much damage to undo. He remembered the vow he’d made to Kieran and silently doubled down. Finley committed right then that he wouldn’t let Kieran go without a fight. He’d ensure the battle was clean and would avoid any form of manipulation, but Finley would play for keeps. Finley couldn’t allow his imagination to run wild and conjure an idea of what his victory would look like; he had to stay rooted in the present so he could learn exactly what he was up against.
Kieran held him tighter as if Finley brought him comfort and helped to ground him, or maybe he was bracing them both for what came next. “I paid closer attention to who Ritchie was talking to and where he was spending his time when we were apart. And I randomly dropped by the body shop with dinner or asked questions about the secret calls. I went through his messages, but he was too smart to leave incriminating evidence. Ritchie was quick with answers that sounded plausible, and he was always where he was supposed to be, but I knew I wasn’t wrong.
“Questions turned into accusations, and we started fighting. He accused me of being paranoid, and I accused him of gaslighting me. We would make up and fall out again and again. As we approached our one-year anniversary, I kept trying to make plans to celebrate. Ritchie always had one excuse after another about why we couldn’t go away for the weekend or even have a nice dinner. I took the night off at the bar without telling him and brought the romantic dinner to his shop, but the place was empty. All his employees were gone for the night, and Ritchie wasn’t in his office, even though his car was in its usual spot.”
Finley tilted his head and kissed the underside of Kieran’s jaw. “I wish I could go back a few weeks and knee him in the balls.”
A chuckle shook his chest before he continued with his story. “My heart sank because there was really only one valid reason he wasn’t there. Someone had picked him up for dinner. I searched his office and found a second phone I didn’t know he had buried in his desk. The battery was dead, and I figured I didn’t have time to charge it and go through it. I found nothing out of place until I went through his trash can and found a note that he’d scribbled on a fast-food napkin.”
Finley snorted. “Dude sure has an MO.” He worried he’d overstepped until a chuckle vibrated through the muscular chest beneath his head. It made Finley want to snuggle closer, but that was impossible unless he could burrow into Kieran’s skin.
“Yeah, he does,” Kieran agreed. “This time the note was to himself. It read, ‘Cash Sweeney. Mackenzie’s Chophouse at 7.’” Finley bolted into a sitting position but didn’t let go of Kieran’s hand. “The meetup was scheduled on our anniversary, which was why Ritchie wasn’t in his office working as he’d claimed. I drove over to the restaurant and parked where I could see the entrance. They didn’t come out until eight thirty or later. Cash was dressed like a millionaire cowboy and Ritchie had put on a sport coat I didn’t know he owned.” Kieran inhaled shakily. “I felt so humiliated seeing them together on our anniversary, but I tried to observe them objectively. It was plain to me that Ritchie was being his most charming self. Cash was laughing at whatever he’d said and didn’t pull away when Ritchie laid his hand on Cash’s bicep or forearm.” Kieran tilted his head to one side. “Now that some time has passed, I think Cash was tolerating Ritchie’s flirtations. He didn’t reciprocate or initiate anything, at least not in public. Not everyone is comfortable with PDA, so I can’t say for sure they weren’t fucking.” His mouth curved into a sneer. “Just not that night. I sent Ritchie a text that I’d gotten off early and was heading toward him with dinner. I watched the fucker fish his phone out of his pocket and read the text. He didn’t reply, but Cash drove him straight back to the body shop.”
“What happened?” Finley asked.
“I beat them back to the shop and was sitting at Ritchie’s desk, dangling the napkin from my fingers when he returned. I’d never seen him look so furious. He verbally attacked me and turned the whole thing around on me. He said it was just an innocent dinner with a potential investor and anything more was all in my imagination. Ritchie reminded me that he had big dreams and Cash was the kind of man who could help him achieve them. He did it forourfuture.” Kieran shook his head. “But I’d recognized the look in Ritchie’s eyes, that determination to get Cash Sweeney in his bed. I knew if it hadn’t already happened, it would only be a matter of time.”
“But you stayed?” Kieran dropped his gaze but not before Finley saw the shame in his dark eyes. Finley cupped his chin and raised it until their eyes met again. “Don’t do that. If you stayed, you thought you had a good reason at the time.”
“No one had told me they loved me until Ritchie,” he said, swallowing hard. “I couldn’t give up. I begged Ritchie for forgiveness.” Tears spilled out of his eyes. “I hate him most for that. I’d never begged anyone for anything until he came along. Ritchie’s love poisoned me and made me weak. I depended on him for everything—the food I ate, the clothes I wore, and even the car I drove belonged to him. My beater died not long after I met Ritchie. He arranged for me to sell it to a junkyard for scrap, and I told him to keep the money toward monthly expenses. I barely worked enough to pay for the apartment he insisted I keep. He was my entire world, and I couldn’t imagine starting over without him. I know that makes me sound pitiful.”
Finley’s heart plummeted, and he dropped their joined hands so he could straddle Kieran’s lap. Cupping his face, Finley said, “Baby, no.” The endearment slipped out, but he wasn’t sorry, and he didn’t want to take it back. “You weren’t weak or pitiful. Ritchie preyed on you from your very first meeting. Everything you’ve described so far is the work of an abusive bastard. Ritchie wanted you to catch him jerking off and fucking himself with a dildo. He wanted you to feel insecure and beaten down. It’s how he kept you in place. I’ll never understand people like him.”
Had Ritchie cheated on Kieran with Cash? That didn’t explain why Finley’s camera equipment was in Cash’s closet. Or did it? Finley knew where Kieran was steering him, but he didn’t want to travel that path. He wanted to think Cash was just another of Ritchie’s innocent victims, but it was getting harder to do. Kieran had alluded to his suspicions earlier but hadn’t come right out and said it. Finley had tried to say it for him, but Kieran had shushed him, presumably so they wouldn’t be overheard. Most of the crew was gone until dinnertime or later, but Kieran had been wise to be cautious. Alone in the small cabin, he no longer had an excuse to put off the inevitable. There was a minimum of three sides to every story—Kieran’s, Cash’s, and the truth. Finley wouldn’t stop asking questions until he’d probed all the angles.
