Page 35 of Written with Regret (The Regret Duet 1)
I chuffed, the tension in my shoulders momentarily easing. “That simple, huh?”
“Well, I took a gamble that you couldn’t resist a redhead. But yeah. Basically.”
I did have a thing for redheads. But not in the way she assumed. “So that’s why you stole my computer for Kaleidoscope?”
Her eyes lit in a way that struck me deep, even if I didn’t understand why. “I don’t know. Are you recording me again?”
“Should I be?” I took a sip of my coffee.
She shrugged. “Probably.”
And I probably should have, but we were way past anything I’d ever want to show to a judge.
I made sure she was watching as I powered off my phone.
She nabbed another sugar, tearing it open before pouring it into her mug. “So anyway. Yes. That’s why I stole your computer. And iPad. And phone.”
“And the wallet?” I clipped, nearly five years of resentment getting the best of me.
Her forehead crinkled. “I’m sorry. I can’t say that enough.”
God, I was a dick. The truth was: If I’d known she was a survivor back then, I would have willingly handed her my wallet, my mother’s necklace included, along with the contents of my bank account just to feel a miniscule of undeserved relief.
“You could have asked me. I’d have looked up your parents for you. It was the least I could have done.”
She shrugged. “Maybe, but if I’d asked and you slammed the door in my face, I’d have lost the element of surprise.”
“And your element of surprise was fucking me into exhaustion instead?”
Shit. I had to get a hold of my emotions.
She leaned against the back of the booth, her body shifting from one side to the other as though she were uncomfortably crossing and uncrossing her legs. “No. That was… I don’t know. I think…” She plucked a napkin from the tabletop dispenser and started shredding it. She rolled four tiny balls before finishing the thought. “I think I just needed a few hours of not feeling miserable anymore. You have to understand, I spent most of my life trying to forget the fear I’d felt that day. It had been years, but it was always on my mind, demanding my attention. I hated it. I wanted to escape it. But it almost became an obsession. So, for a few hours, I used you as a distraction. I’m sorry.”
I couldn’t even be mad at her. A distraction. That was exactly what she had been to me. A way to forget. A way to focus on someone else. A way to avoid the mirror.
“Was it your plan to get pregnant? Some fucked-up version of revenge?”
Her eyes flashed wide. “No. Not at all. I swear to you. Trust me, nobody was more surprised than I was. I had the implant birth control. I didn’t even think it was a possibility. I found out when I was four months along, and even then, I didn’t want to believe it.” She threaded her fingers in the top of her hair, shoving it all to one side. “I thought maybe you’d call the cops after I’d stolen your stuff if I told you.”
“I would have. I absolutely would have.”
She bit her bottom lip and looked off to the side. “And you’d have been right to do that.”
It didn’t feel right anymore. It felt like I’d poached a broken woman to get my fucking cock off. Just what I needed: more guilt.
“You weren’t able to get into my computer, were you?” I asked.
“Nope. I hired a guy and everything. The only thing he was able to figure out was that you had a twenty-two-character password. He was still working on getting into the computer when suddenly it shut down and wouldn’t restart. He couldn’t even pull anything off the hard drive or whatever it’s called.”
I smirked. “You don’t create a technology company without learning how to secure a laptop first.”
“Touché.” She smiled, and as much as I fought it, it made me smile too.
This was a conversation with a woman I was supposed to hate. No one—especially me—should have been smiling.
She must have felt the awkwardness at the same time I did, because she once again leveled her gaze on the table. A tendril of her long hair escaped from behind her ear, and with the grace of a dream, she tucked it back, revealing that smile all over again.
And that was when mine disappeared.
She could explain away stalking me down at that bar.
She could explain away stealing my computer.
She could even explain away fucking me as a distraction.
But there was one thing she’d never be able to make me understand.
“How could you leave her like that?”
Her head snapped up, her eyes wide and filled with sorrow. “Caven…”
“You don’t deserve her.”
She flinched, quickly closing her mouth.
“We all lived shitty lives, Hadley. You don’t think I’m not still fucked up from the shooting? You don’t think I have my dark days? Hell, I’ve had years of darkness. But Rosalee, she didn’t do anything wrong.” The bitterness and resentment came rushing back like a flash flood to my system. “She didn’t deserve to be abandoned by her own mother.”
