Page 8 of Written with You (The Regret Duet 2)
You saved my life at the mall. I’d implored him to hear my silent confession.
But I was such a coward. That was all it would ever be—silence.
There had to be a way to stop this wrecking ball before it destroyed us all.
Trent hadn’t said any more about my identity after Caven and I had come outside. I’d waited, expecting him to spill it all at any second. I was ready to lie and deny it with every fiber of my being.
But that hadn’t been necessary. Trent had simply sat back, propped his feet up, and sipped a beer as he’d watched his niece fawn all over me.
I’d put on a brave smile as I ate cake with Rosalee sitting on my lap, but as I’d left Caven’s house, I’d hugged that little girl extra tight, terrified that it might be the last time I felt her arms wrapped around my neck. Then, on the way home, I’d called Beth in a frenzied panic, giving her the rundown of the latest mountain we were forced to climb. I hadn’t been home ten minutes before she came bursting through my front door.
My whole body shook as we made eye contact. There was no denying that I was on the verge of a panic attack—and not the kind a script from my doctor could head off. There was no stopping this runaway train.
“He knows. This is bad. This is so, so bad.”
“Relax,” she soothed, approaching me with caution as though I were an animal in the wild. “It’s not a big deal.”
“It’s a huge deal. He’s going to tell Caven that I’m not Hadley. He’s going to tell him.” My voice cracked as the reality of what it’d mean if Trent told Caven crashed over me.
She half shrugged. “What are the chances that Caven would even believe him?”
“I don’t know. Trent’s his brother. Why wouldn’t he believe him? Once he introduces the idea to Caven, that’ll be it.”
“Be real here.” Beth lifted my arms to inspect for bruises. “This asshole cop who doesn’t know how to keep his damn hands to himself has no proof. Speculation holds up in court about as well as an eye witness description from a wet dream. He’s not dumb. He’s not going to spill some crazy conspiracy theory without something to back it up.”
I shook free of her hold and raked my hands through my hair. “It’s true though. He was totally right, and if he keeps searching—”
“He can’t prove it.”
“What about my medical records?” I croaked out over the pounding of my heart as it attempted to escape through my ribs. “You said it yourself. They’re the only flaw in my plan.”
“Yes, but Hadley’s appendectomy will explain away your scar. A judge isn’t going to order an invasive physical based on hearsay.”
I yanked up the side of my shirt. “No one is going to buy this as an appendectomy scar. No one.”
“Then I’ll make them believe it.” Her gaze roamed over my face, her eyes imploring me to believe her. “This is my job, Lo. All we need is reasonable doubt, and we’ve got that in spades. We’ve got her journals and details about that night with Caven that no one but Hadley could ever know. I wouldn’t have agreed to help you if I didn’t know we could handle whatever came up along the way. I’m not worried about one man’s hypothesis. You shouldn’t be, either.” She punctuated each word with a jab of her finger.
I shook my head and resumed my pace. How had this gone from Wednesday and Saturday art classes, birthday dinners where Caven called me his family, and a night of passion and orgasms to being one name away from losing it all?
What a gigantic clusterfuck. It had been from the day I’d decided to become Hadley Banks.
It wasn’t hard to become my sister. She’d died in my car, with my purse recovered at the scene of the accident. Her body had been mangled and then burned. Beth had spared me the details, but I knew there were no fingerprints left to be found. All signs had pointed to me. It was why Beth had accepted that I had been in that car for two weeks before flying to Puerto Rico to clean out my house.
Hadley and I had pulled the twin switch numerous times throughout our life, but this was taking it to a new level. However, it was the only chance I had at getting to know little Keira—or Rosalee, as it turned out.
I’d never wanted to hurt Caven. That was always the truth. But I had been too afraid to walk back into his life as Rosalee’s aunt. If he had slammed the door in my face, there would have been no recourse. I had no rights to her.
