Page 90 of Lead Me On
Mr. Jennings didn’t move. He watched her as if he were waiting for more.
“That’s who I am,” she said softly.
His brow furrowed. “Okay.”
“I wanted to tell you the truth. I acted out as a teenager. I wanted to leave that behind, so I changed my name.”
“To Jane Morgan?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.” He shook his head, frowning harder. “So…that’s the truth about the past, but Jane Morgan is the truth now.”
Her heart twisted. “Yes.”
“I don’t understand. Were you afraid to tell me this?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Why? Because despite her earlier calm, she felt as if she was going to throw up and cry and run away, all at the same time. “Because nobody knows.”
He smiled at that, a wide grin that stretched across his face. “Well, I’m glad you trust me, then. I won’t tell anyone. You’re not going to ask me to hire your brother when he gets out, are you?”
“Oh, God, no!”
“Do you need tomorrow off to go to his hearing?”
“Just an hour or so.”
He nodded. “All right, then.”
And that was it. She’d done it. She’d told Mr. Jennings the truth. It hadn’t been terrible at all really, but it was just the beginning. Three people in Aspen knew the truth about her now. More would find out. Things were going to change, and the harbinger of that change was walking into the office with a disarming smile when she closed Mr. Jennings’s door behind her.
“Hi, Jane,” Greg said so cheerfully that she was struck with a moment of vertigo. He was trying to blackmail her into sex, so why did he look ready for a real date?
Jane stared at Greg, forcing her face to stay impassive. “One moment,” she said as she sat down and picked up the phone to take care of the last bullet point on her to-do list. A phone call to her least favorite surveying manager. The man was rude and foulmouthed, but for once she didn’t want the conversation to end. She waited until the contractor hung up and the line began to beep before she set the receiver down.
“Are you ready?” Greg asked. His eyes swept down her plain black jacket, and the sight tightened his mouth a little, but he didn’t say anything. Had he expected her to wear something low cut?
Arrogant dog.
“Are you really going to do this?” she murmured.
His smile betrayed no hint of guilt. “I’m just trying to reconnect with my girlfriend. What’s wrong with that?”
Jane got up and stepped around to the front of her desk so there was no chance of Mr. Jennings overhearing them through his door. “Just a few days ago you made clear I wasn’t good enough to be your girlfriend. I’m trash, remember?”
“Oh, I remember,” he said happily.
Great.
Greg’s eyes slid toward Mr. Jennings’s office. “Are we going out or not?”
He couldn’t threaten her with Quinn Jennings now, but Jane grabbed her purse and headed for the door regardless. She needed to get this over with before she chickened out, but her blood was singing with alarm.
This was dangerous. It was real. She was furious and afraid and hurt. But her face was blank as glass as she walked to his car. She could feel the cool stiffness.
