Page 44 of Forged in Peril

He rushed over to where she stood, resting his hands gently on her shoulders, just as the tears began to spill over.

“Hey. Hey. What’s wrong? What happened?”

She tried to swallow the sobs that strangled her throat, but she couldn’t.

“It’s okay,” he said, reaching up and stroking her hair. “Shh. It’s okay.”

She rested her head against his chest, closing her eyes, willing her lungs to work properly again.

After a few moments had passed, she pulled back, gently this time, and tilted her chin up until his blue eyes met hers.

“There are some things I need to tell you,” she said, forcing the words out before she could change her mind.

She was desperate for justice, and her colleagues at Forge Brothers Security could help her get it. She just needed to be brave.

“You can tell me anything,” Cam said, reaching up and stroking the side of her jaw gently with his thumb.

She pressed herself into his chest again, drawing several slow breaths.

She was ready.

CHAPTER

FIFTEEN

CAMERON

Cameron took Bristol’s hand within his own and led her toward the corner where he’d laid out her sleeping bag, propping the pillow up behind her so that she could lean against the wall.

He settled in beside her, giving her a few inches of space, which she quickly filled, leaning against his shoulder as she drew several long breaths. He let the silence stretch out between them, not wanting to say or do anything that would make her pull away again.

He could almost feel the heaviness of her unspoken secret closing in around them, suffocating them both, a shadow that had been chasing her long before her car had been destroyed and her home broken into.

Whatever it was, he had to know, even if all it meant was that she no longer had to carry her burden alone.

At last, she spoke.

“I don’t know if I ever really told you back then exactly why I wanted to get into law,” she began, keeping her head against his shoulder so that she wouldn’t have to meet his eyes. “I loved the idea of helping people to seek justice for their crimes, and even the idea of making sure that those who had wronged others would be treated fairly and get a worthy defense in court.”

He nodded, saying nothing. This didn't surprise him, though she’d never exactly articulated it.

Bristol had always excelled in academics, and when combined with her love for helping others, it made sense to him that she’d find the law to be an appealing career option.

“Anyway, to sum up several very difficult years, that passion only grew as I did my undergrad in New York, followed by my paralegal program. Finally, I had the chance to work on real cases, even if it was mostly as a grunt for a slew of cranky lawyers.”

“Sorry if that hasn’t changed much in your new job here,” he joked.

She cracked a smile in return, but a moment later, her expression grew serious again.

“I loved Manhattan, but it’s expensive, and soon enough it became clear that if I wanted to actually go to law school and take this job all the way, I’d have to live somewhere that allowed me to work and actually save up some of the money. I applied to firms all over the country, but in the end, I realized that honing in my search on Texas made the most sense. I hated how long I’d left my mom alone. When I heard back from Dorling & Porter, it felt Providential. Ha.”

She paused, and Cameron’s heart ached at the sadness that filled her eyes.

God bringing her back to Silver Grove made sense, sure, but He certainly hadn’t wanted Bristol to fall victim to the evil that had followed, whatever it was.

Before he could tell her this, however, she pressed on.

“As you probably can figure out from the timeline, I ended up at D&P for about two years. There was a lot I loved about it, to tell you the truth. I got to work on a lot of complex case law and was handed a lot of responsibility. I dedicated more hours to the job than anyone else in the paralegal department and worked my way to a very respected position. It probably wasn’t a healthy work-life balance–I know it wasn’t, actually–but I was able to scrape together enough to pay for an apartment I loved. I even started socking away some money for law school.”

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