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For the first time in years, I don’t consider my body the broken traitor I’ve accused and convicted it of being. I see it as an ally.
Coming out of the bathroom, somebody standing inside my office’s doorway startles me, and I quickly hide the pregnancy test behind my wrist. After getting a better look at who it is, I tuck it up my sleeve.
“God, Ree—” I remember myself, my surroundings, my…situation. Why is he here right now? I thought I had more time to figure out what to say to him. Ineedmore time to figure out what to say to him. “Mr. Souza, I wasn’t expecting you.”
He frowns. “Are you okay?”
“Hmm.” I avoid his questioning stare to glance at my desk, a bunch of flowers already awaiting me. Sweet Peas. I don’t know much about them other than they’re my birth month flower. “Why are you here? The plan was to meet up tonight.”
Shooting a look over his shoulder, he says, “This can’t wait. We have to talk before then.”
I follow his gaze. “Not here. Not now.”
“Here and now’s all I got.”
“Mr. Souza—”
“Why are you calling me that again?”
“I have a meeting that I need to prepare for. If you’d just—”
“Lex, what’s going on? Why are you acting like this? And what…” His gaze sharpening on my chin, he takes a step forward.
Unfortunately, I tilt my head too late to hide the scrape from Kordin’s cast, and with vitriol lacing his tone, he grinds out, “What happened to your face?”
“Mr. Souza, I don’t want to have to call security, but I will.”
Another step in my direction, then, “Did Kordin do that to you?”
“I was in a car accident yesterday.”
“Liar.”
One eye out the glass wall, I continue like I’m reading from a script, “A minor fender bender causing my chin to hit the steering wheel and—”
“Is that the story he told you to say? Why are you covering for him?”
“I’m not covering for anyone. I was in a car accident.”
“Lex. Tell me what really happened or I’ll go beat it out of him myself. They can’t arrest me twice.”
This brings my full attention back to him. “What do you mean by that?”
“That’s what I came to tell you. I’m heading upstate for a while.”
Upstate. Not the upstate we live in, or the further north upstate that Reece wants to live in, but prison. It’s a more dignified way of saying “I’m going to prison.”
“For what?”
“Forgery.” Reaching behind his back, he pulls out a stack of papers and drops them on my desk, the force causing them to slide across the glossy surface to me.
I recognize them instantly as the work orders he was supposed to get from Kaisin last night. The work orders Kordin either forged himself or had someone else forge for him…
I meet Reece’s obsidian eyes. They’re bloodshot with bags under them. While I can’t smell his cologne, I am picking up a faint char odor.
“What’d you do?” I demand.
He answers like he’s going off his own script, saying, “I was hired by Kordin Debrosse to create fraudulent invoices with the intent to defraud Debrosse Investment Properties Group, while making it look like his wife, Lenox Debrosse, was the one responsible.”
