Page 134 of Logan
Porter goes even paler, if possible, his skin taking on a grayish hue. “I... That is... Yes, I did receive a file, b–but I didn’t realize... I mean, I didn’t know what... I just opened the attachment without thinking...”
“Oh, I think you knew exactly what it was.” I lean in closer until I can smell the sour stench of his fear. “Why else would you take the extra step of forwarding it to your personal device? Wanted a little masturbation material for later, is that it?”
I vibrate with the effort it takes not to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze until his eyeballs pop out of his skull. The image of him hunched over his phone, his dick in his hand, as he watches Sloane—my Sloane—in her most intimate, vulnerable moment makes me want to set the world on fire.
Porter quakes, his hands raised. “I didn’t... It wasn’t like that, I swear! I just... I wasn’t thinking clearly. It was a horrible lapse in judgment, I know that now. I’m so, so sorry?—”
“Your phone. Now.” I thrust out my hand, my expression brooking no argument.
Porter’s mouth works soundlessly for a moment before he fumbles in his pocket and produces the device with shakingfingers. He places it in my outstretched palm like it’s a live grenade.
I swipe through to his photos, my gorge rising as I find the video. I want to vomit, to put my fist through a wall, to rain down unholy retribution on this quivering sack of shit. But I force myself to focus, to do what needs to be done.
“Did you send this to anyone else?” I demand as I delete the file with a vicious stab of my finger. “Post it anywhere, share it with anyone outside the company?”
“N–no, I swear it!” Porter’s voice cracks with desperation, with the naked fear of a man who knows his life is crumbling around him. “I didn’t do anything with it, I just... I saved it for my own...use,” he finishes, his face flushing a dull red.
I stare at him, letting my disgust and contempt roll off me in waves. I believe him, if only because he strikes me as too much of a pathetic bottom-feeder to have the balls to actually disseminate the video further. Still, that doesn’t change what he did, the complete and utter violation of trust, of basic human decency.
I toss his phone back to him, watching with grim satisfaction as he fumbles and nearly drops it.
“You’re fired,” I say. “Effective immediately. Security will escort you out and confiscate your company devices. If I find out you made copies of that video, that you kept even a single frame of it... Well, let’s just say you better hope I don’t.”
“When are you getting here?” Sloane’s voice is a balm to my frayed nerves, even through the speaker of my phone. I can picture her curled up on her couch, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth as she waits for my response.
“I need to take care of something first,” I say, my gaze locked on the unsuspecting figure puttering around in the garden across the street.
John fucking Rambett, without a care in the world, unaware of the reckoning headed his way. My muscles tremble with the effort it takes to stay in the car, to not march over there and introduce his smug face to my fists.
“You found out who filmed the video.” It’s not a question. Sloane has always been able to see right through me, read me like an open book, no matter how hard I try to maintain my mask of cool indifference.
I exhale, the sound harsh in the confines of the car. “Yes.” No point in lying to her. I could never lie to her.
“Who is it, Logan?”
I hesitate, weighing my words. “I don’t think you want to know, Sloane. It’s not… It’s only going to hurt you more.”
“Logan, I’m the one filmed there, the one exposed to everyone, the one whose career is in ruins. I have a right to know who did this to me. I need to know.”
“John Rambett.”
Silence. I hear her breathing, quick and shallow, can feel the shock and betrayal radiating through the phone. “Sloane? Talk to me. Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I just can’t believe it was him, I was sure... I thought...” Her voice breaks.
“I’ll handle him, baby,” I promise, my voice low and dark with menace. “He’ll never hurt you again, I swear it.”
“Wait.” Alarm rings clearly in her tone. “What do you mean, ‘handle him’? Logan, what are you going to do?”
“What needs to be done.”
“Don’t… Don’t kill him, Logan. Promise me.” She sounds frightened now, horrified at the depths of violence she must hear in my voice.
“He hurt you, Sloane. Betrayed you in the worst possible way. Why the hell should I show him mercy he doesn’t deserve? Why are you defending him? Do you still care about him? Do you… Do you still love him?” I hate how vulnerable I sound, how pathetically insecure, but the thought of her still harboring feelings for that snake, even after everything he’s done.
“No! God, no. Logan. It’s you I love. Only you.” The fierce conviction in her voice soothes the jagged ache in my chest, the raw, ugly part of me that still can’t quite believe I get to have this, have her. “I don’t give a damn about John Rambett. I want to see him punished for what he’s done, I want him to pay. But not like that. Not if it means you throwing your life away, doing something you can’t come back from. I don’t want that for you. For us.”
I’m silent for a long moment, struggling against the black tide of rage and possessiveness threatening to drag me under. She’s right, I know she is.
