Page 48 of Mine to Hold
“Not the time to be making that joke.” She cocked her head.
He kissed her in that sweet, tender way he had that let her know he was on her side and she wanted to hate him for it. She didn’t want him to care about her because she was only going to hurt him in the end.
She pushed him away. “Let’s get this over with.” She snagged the bag with all the money in it, minus what she’d earned on her own. That wasn’t much, but it was hers and she wasn’t going to part with it.
“What’s that?”
“I don’t want to have to explain this twice.” She dragged the suitcase through the door and across the pool deck, doing her best to hold her head high.
Emmerson was one step behind her and he managed to pull out a chair for her, being a true gentleman.
This time, she took the beer Rhett offered and chugged half of it. “Any chance I can cut some kind of immunity deal or something?”
“That’s not something I have the power to do,” Rebecca said. “But something tells me no matter what’s in your past, you won’t need it.”
“I don’t know how these things work, so I have no idea.” Rumor kept one hand curled around her beer, and the other she rested on the bag of cash.
“If what you tell us is indeed criminal, and we have to take it to the next level, we know a couple of good attorneys and of course, we’ll put in a good word,” Rebecca said. “But again, we’re getting ahead of ourselves.”
“Not to mention what we dug up doesn’t add up to you being arrested for anything,” Rhett added. “We just need you to fill in the blanks so Emmerson and our mom can do their jobs.”
Rumor nodded. “Can I just start talking without all the questions? It makes me nervous.”
Emmerson took her hand. “Whatever you want.” He kissed her palm.
Damn fucking man was too kind.
She sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “So, we all know I lied about knowing who Tom Hemming is, but for the record, I never sold drugs for him. Ever. I wasn’t that girl.”
“We believe you,” Rebecca said.
God, she hoped so.
“As I told you, I met Tony while I was in foster care. What I left out was that he was my boyfriend.” Rumor swallowed the bile that smacked the back of her throat, but it didn’t go down. It got lodged there and not even another sip of beer would make it go away.
“We gathered that when we learned you were living with him after you left the system,” Emmerson said.
She cocked her head. “Please, just let me get through this without interruption.”
Emmerson nodded.
“Tony lied to me when we first moved in together. He told me he was done with that life. That he had turned over a new leaf, but he hadn’t. And he kept trying to pull me in. I knew I needed to leave, but I didn’t have any money. It was an abusive relationship.”
Emmerson growled. It was deep, low, and menacing.
“He would tell me we were going out to dinner, only we’d end up doing a drug run first. One day, we went to this guy’s house. I had no idea that Tony planned on not only double-crossing thisone dealer, but Tom as well. He killed the guy, right in front of me.”
“Jesus.” Emmerson squeezed her hand.
“I’m sorry you had to witness that,” Rebecca said.
“It was the worst thing I’ve ever seen in my life. It came out of nowhere,” Rumor said. “One minute they were talking, the next minute…” She paused, taking a deep breath and wiping the tears away. “Tony collected the drugs and the money. He was even the one to call the cops. He then called Tom and told him that he couldn’t collect because the building was surrounded by the police.”
“That’s convenient,” Miles said. “Did Tom buy it?”
“It was all over the news, so yeah. Besides, Tony was in tight with Tom.” Never in a million years did she think she’d be sitting at a table with two cops and two private dicks, telling this story. But here she was and all she could think about was what cold metal might feel like around her wrists.
“What did you do?” Rhett asked.
