Page 83 of Playing With Danger

I’d started this. Now I had to see it through.

“I’m at Valentine’s but?—”

“On my way.”

Shit.

“Hayden, you can’t come here.”

“Come again?”

“Just listen to me.”

“I would but you’re not talking except to tell me everything’s wrong and I can’t come to you.”

I shouldn’t have called him. Hayden was just as protective as Valentine. This could—and would—turn ugly fast if Hayden came here and Valentine came home. Likely Valentine would tell Hayden to take me and Hayden wouldn’t like that so he’d gladly whisk me away, then I wouldn’t be able to do what I needed to do.

“I think I screwed up and I need your help.”

“How’d you screw up?”

“Valentine broke up with me and left. He told me he didn’t want me here when he got back and I told him I wasn’t leaving,” I rushed out.

“Fuck that! I’m coming to get you.”

God!

“Please don’t. I need you to listen but I can’t tell you everything without breaking Valentine’s confidence. But I can give you a little so you understand the gist, then you can tell me if I messed up and how to fix it.”

There was a brief pause and a car door slammed on his end.

“You can’t come here,” I hissed, panic rising to a fever-pitch.

“Start talking, Huxley, but I make no promises.”

I started talking. I told him just enough without telling him things that I knew for certain Valentine wouldn’t want him to know. Which meant I left out his father’s drinking problem. But I did explain that Valentine lost his mother and sister and his father hadn’t recovered. I also had to tell him that Valentine’s father made him feel unworthy. I knew Hayden would never tell him anything that I said, but it still felt like a betrayal. But I needed him to understand so he could guide me.

“Did I totally screw up?” I whispered when I was done.

“No, Soph, you didn’t screw up,” Hayden said, then blew out a breath. “Did he say where he was going?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to go and find him?”

He’d do that for me but also for Valentine. The two men were friends and Hayden was the type of friend who didn’t allow his friends to suffer in silence. Case in point, now, when he’d put himself in front of Valentine’s pain and make himself a target to help him see his way through it.

“No. Just talk me through this. He was really mad, Hayden.”

“Fuck!” he clipped. “Can I come pick you up? We’ll go someplace and talk then I’ll drop you back at his place.”

“I don’t know how long he’ll be gone and I have to be here when he gets back. I have to be here. Before he left I told him I’d be here, ready to fight to prove to him he’s worth it. If I leave he’ll never see what he means to me. He won’t ever trust it. You didn’t see him, Hayden. He was empty, haunted, totally destroyed. I can’t leave this house until I either win or I have nothing left.”

“Christ, you’re killing me, Sophie.”

“Help. Me. Hayden. Am I not supposed to stay and fight? Am I doing this wrong? I can’t screw this up or I’ll lose him. I saw it happen, the second he shut down on me. I have one shot at getting him back.”

“You love him.”

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