Page 46 of The Way I Hate Him
“I’m paying her under the table. She’s helping organize all my fan mail and a year’s worth of shit accumulated in my office. Ryland doesn’t know the real reason she’s in town. She told him she was doing some internship. But yeah, she’s coming to my house daily to work.”
“Ryland is going to lose his shit.” Abel presses his fingers into his forehead. “Are you trying to blow up the town? Because you know that’s what will happen when Ryland finds out.”
“I don’t know, man. She looked desperate, sad . . . and for some reason, I took pity on her. I mean, the feud has always been between me and Ryland. She’s just an innocent bystander, but for the life of me, I couldn’t stop myself.”
“Tell me this,” he says, leveling with me. “Are you fucking her?”
“No,” I reply. “It’s nothing like that.”
“Good.” He pinches his brow now. “I don’t think I could handle that kind of news.” He looks me dead in the eyes. “It’s just a job?”
“Yeah, just a job.” I fail to mention how I might have checked her out a few times, made mental notes about how I could twist and turn her body into submission, and fully thought about how her breasts would fit into my palms and into my mouth easily. “And for the record, she needed the help. Badly.”
“Are you trying to paint yourself as a saint?”
“Is it working?”
He laughs and shakes his head. “I mean, if I didn’t know about the other half, I wouldn’t see anything wrong with it, but given Ryland is my other best friend, my dick is quivering in fear as to what he might do if he finds out.”
“You think he’d be mad?”
“Are you kidding?” Abel asks, dumbfounded. “Dude, if he finds out about this, it won’t end pretty, guaranteed. Not only will he probably end your life for even talking to his baby sister, but his relationship with Hattie will suffer greatly. This is . . . this would be the ultimate betrayal in his eyes. I don’t think they’d recover.”
Fuck, he’s so right.
This isn’t just some simple agreement between me and Hattie. This is so much bigger than that. This is bad blood, and testing the strength and power of that bad blood can only lead to more trouble.
Trouble Hattie can’t afford. Trouble Ryland can’t either. The man is so fucking proud and a damn good big brother. He always stepped up more than I thought necessary when his mom died—looking after his little sisters with ferocity—but now...having Cassidy’s kid too?
I could take anything that comes my way, even if it’s a barrage of Ryland’s fists. I have no stake in the game. I have nothing to lose.
But Hattie, she has everything to lose. As much as I want to pretend I don’t care about anyone, a small piece of me does care. I was once very close with the Rowleys. With Ryland. With Cassidy. I know the bond they have, a bond I so desperately wanted to be a part of . . . that I was a part of before everything went down. I know what it feels like to be shunned by the Rowleys.
I wouldn’t want Hattie to have to go through that too.
“Don’t worry.” I pick up my water and take a sip. “We don’t plan on him finding out.”
“You better hope not. Your chances are slim, though. You know you can trust me, but one slip-up and the town will put the pieces together. You’re treading dangerous waters.”
“It’s not like I’m doing anything wrong,” I defend.
“Other than blackmailing Ryland’s sister into working for you?”
“That’s a minor detail.”
“Let’s hope it stays that way.”
ChapterSeven
HATTIE
“Do you need help closing up?” I ask Aubree as I step into the main part of the shop.
“Nope, I’m all set,” she says as she shuts down her laptop.
“Okay.” I stand awkwardly, unsure how to bridge this uncomfortable gap between me and my sister. Granted, we’ve never held super close, best friend status, but with the death of Cassidy, it feels like there’s a Grand Canyon worth of space between us. “What are you doing for dinner?”
“Probably eating whatever leftovers I have in the fridge,” she answers while packing her backpack.
