Page 99 of Nothing to Deny

“That was before… Oh my God, you weren’t going to tell me? You thought I would just… How could you keep this from me?”

“I love you. I didn’t want to change what we—I love you. This doesn’t change anything.”

“If it wasn’t for Freya, for Baer—oh my God. How could you hide this from me?”

“Skit,” Baer said, attracting her focus.

He dipped his head to the side. Yeah, this was the kind of conversation the couple should have alone. There was still a chance Nickson wouldn’t tell the full truth, so some part of her wanted to hang around, just in case. But that really would go against Baer’s request they stay out of it. Besides, Kelly could be done with him. If she was, did it matter what stories he told?And if she wasn’t, Holly would get the full rundown. She trusted one cousin to set the other straight if it was needed.

“Wait a second…” Kelly halted them before they could leave. “How did you know this? How did you know that he…?”

Her eyes tracked to Baer’s, whose stuck to her cousin. “‘Cause I work there too.”

Judgment or disgust be damned, an odd ball of pride warmed her. Wherever the chips fell, his honesty prevailed. And he hadn’t hesitated.

With an arm around her, he guided her out to the hall and closed the bedroom door. His trajectory suggested he intended to take them downstairs again. She turned to him, pushing her weight against the arm he had around her to angle him her way.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “You said stay out of it and—”

“It’s done now. She knows. That’s what you wanted.”

Was that why he’d done it?

“You didn’t have to tell her the truth about you.”

“Nick will tell her anyway. If he’s going down, he’ll take someone with him.”

“Not you.”

“If your family find out—”

“Find out what? That I’m with a good, honest, decent man? A man willing to do whatever it takes to save his own family, people he loves, from enduring hardship and tragedy? I’m not ashamed to be with that man. I’m not ashamed of what you do, or why you do it. Our jobs, in one sense, are the same. We help people. We do for others what they can’t do for themselves.”

She did it with money. He did it with his body. It just so happened that the people he helped, who couldn’t help themselves, were two twelve-year-old boys and his parents. The essence was the same.

“What will we tell your aunt and uncle?”

She sighed. “That the couple want an evening to themselves.”

“Won’t they assume that means sex?”

“If we’re lucky,” she said, hoping there wouldn’t be too many questions. “Better they assume that than we just—”

“Detonated their relationship?”

Not quite the way she’d have put it. Was that what he thought? She’d gone in there to blast the couple apart. Now she doubted not only her role but her motive. She’d never thought of herself as someone who created drama or coveted it. It was supposed to be quiet conversation, a request Nickson tell Kelly the truth. She hadn’t intended for it to play out the way it did.

“They’ll be okay. It’s a shock, but she’ll get over it.”

“Are you sure?”

No. No one could be sure of anything in this world. If it didn’t work out, would that night forever tarnish her relationship with Kelly? Would they get over it? The couple had to hash this out themselves. Until that happened, there was nothing anyone else could do.

THIRTY-ONE

“NO, THEY’RE STILL in their bedroom,” Holly said, shuffling across the bed a little more.

Baer was in the shower; Freya was sitting up in their bed. Their libidos cried out to be sated, distance was turning out to be their only hope. If she followed him in there…

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