Page 113 of Nothing to Deny

“I didn’t invite you.”

“You’re going to confront this guy about screwing with our relationship, you’re not doing it alone.”

“We don’t have a relationship.” This was unexpected and, these days, she didn’t like unexpected. How was she supposed to stay cool and reasoned with an interloper in tow? “We’ll drop you wherever—”

“No. Thanks for the offer, but I’m not going anywhere.”

“Yes, you are,” she said. “We are not doing this. I don’t need a chaperone with my own grandfather. This is Dere family business, nothing to do with you.”

“He came for me to get to you—”

“That’s not what happened.”

“So what did happen?”

Exactly the question. “That’s what I’m going to find out.”

“We. That’s whatwe’regoing to find.”

“Why would you want to be here? Yesterday you demanded I get out of your life. Now you’re in my car. I’m sorry for Roxie hiring you last night. If it interrupted things with your other client, I’ll call Conrad and apologize. Or was your client at the Crimson party?” Maybe Roxie got to him through the client. Few people would refuse an invitation from Roxie Kyst. She closed her eyes and shifted her purse. “Don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.” She’d have to visit that building in future and did not want to carry the visual with her. “Would you like us to take you home or to Squires?”

“Neither. I’m coming to meet this Truman, find out why he got in my head.”

“Oh, and you think that attitude will encourage me to take you along? No. This is between me and my grandfather.”

“And me. I can talk to him alone—”

“This is none of your business. And you wouldn’t even get through the gate without me. You want me to leave your family alone? You leave mine alone.”

“We can fight about this from here until your grandfather’s doorstep, I’m coming either way.”

“No, you’re not.”

“What are you going to do? Wrestle me out of the car?”

Okay, what kind of gentleman was he? No, she couldn’t wrestle him out of the car. Well, she could, not personally, of course, she’d have someone do it for her. Except she was not that person and wouldn’t do that to him.

This wasn’t a simple request for information.

“You want to know if it’s true, don’t you? You still doubt me. That’s what this is, isn’t it? You want to watch me ask him, because you still believe it was me.”

“No, I want to stand next to you while you accuse him and ask him what the hell gives him the right to interfere with us. I almost lost you because of this. He’s got to know he crossed the line.”

Almost…? What was he saying? She was afraid to ask and fixed her eyes on the privacy screen between them and the driver. She couldn’t hope, couldn’t let her mind run away with daydreams again.

“What would Roxie do?” she whispered to herself.

“When we’re through here, we’re going back to yours.”

Who did he think he was? “You can’t dictate my day, you’re not coming back to mine. I don’t want you at mine.”

Because it was the only place they’d made love, and that was the memory of him there that she wanted to keep.

He took her hand to his lap. “I’m not insecure about you being worth more than me. The money thing screws with my head because we’ve had no one to rely on for a long time. Makes it difficult to trust someone would stick around, that someone might want to get involved with my messed-up family.”

Startled, she fixated on their united fingers. “Your family isn’t messed up,” she muttered before snapping from her daze and snatching back her hand. “And that doesn’t explain why you’d accuse me of being duplicitous. I was only ever interested in an equal partnership and we always communicated, we’ve never hidden things from each other.”

As far as she knew.

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