The Man I Thought I Trusted - E. L. Todd Page 0,82

He moved away with the gang.

I never took my eyes off Dax.

He pressed his forehead to mine and held me close, inhaling a deep breath when we were reunited. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah…”

The officer gave us some time, but then he opened the back door again. “Ma’am, we need you to give that statement down at the precinct.”

I didn’t want to leave, but I knew I had to finish this.

Dax pulled his hands away, even though it seemed to take all his strength to do it.

There was so much I wanted to say, but I didn’t know how to say it. So, I just said the first thing that came to mind. “I’m sorry…”

His hands moved to mine, and he gripped them.

“Take me back…” I’d thought I would never see his face again, see the man I loved with my whole heart. Once he was gone, I’d realized what I had lost, that I was just as complicated as he was.

He slid one hand into his pocket, grabbed something, and then placed it in my palm before he closed my fingers around it.

I could feel it. This time, I knew it wasn’t a key.

It was my ring.

I opened my fingers, looked at it, and started to cry.

He watched me, his eyes still wet.

I slid it back onto my left hand, where it should have stayed in the first place.

“I’ll wait for you at the apartment. When you get back, we’ll go home.”

I smiled through my tears.

He cupped my face again and kissed me. “I love you.”

I grabbed on to him and didn’t know how I would ever let go, how I would ever part with the man who completed my soul. “I love you.”

29

Carson

I stepped into Vince’s office and set the article on his desk along with the digital copy. “It’s done.”

He didn’t grab it right away like he usually did. He didn’t grab that ugly red pen to mark it up and rip it apart. He just stared at me. “I’m sure it’s great, Carson.”

I gave a slight smile.

“You doing okay?”

“Yeah.” I touched the area around my bruised eye, which had improved significantly over the last few days. “It feels a lot better than it looks. And honestly, it could have been so much worse, so…no complaints.”

He nodded. “I’m happy you’re doing well. Not sure what I would have done if we’d lost you.”

“Well…I have some bad news on that front—”

“I meant you as a person, Carson. Not a reporter.”

My eyes began to water slightly.

“I assumed you would be stepping down. You’ve accomplished more than reporters twice your age. I think it’s okay for you to retire, let someone else carry the torch. And good news, I’ve got an opening in the Lifestyle section.” He grinned.

I rolled my eyes. “God, I’d rather be a hot dog vendor on the street.”

He chuckled. “You wouldn’t last. You’d eat everything and have nothing to sell.”

“Yeah. Probably.”

“So, you want your old job back?” he asked. “The prime minister is no Simon Prescott, but he’s got his merits.”

“Yes, I’ll take it. I’m excited to slow down.”

He grabbed my article and set it to the side like he intended to read it when I left his office. “How’s your boyfriend doing?”

“Fiancé,” I corrected, holding up my ring. “And he’s just happy that I’m okay.”

He straightened in his chair and grabbed the paper. “You haven’t heard the news, I take it?”

My eyes narrowed.

He held up the front-page headline. “The Feds hit him with a hundred million dollar fine for breaching the privacy laws. He’ll have that on his record forever.”

“Shit…” I had no idea.

He shrugged. “If he hadn’t done it, you’d be dead. So I have a feeling he doesn’t regret it.”

30

Dax

I stood at my desk and read the notice several times, even though I’d already absorbed all the information I needed to know. My lawyer said there was no way to dispute it, and it was smart just to pay it and make it go away.

Renee stood with her arms crossed over her chest. “How do you think this will affect the company?”

I shrugged. “Scandals come and go. People will forget in the next news cycle.”

“But people will never trust our software again, not when we pulled a stunt like that.”

“I did what I had to do to save Carson—and I don’t regret it.” She was beside me every night again, but it was still hard for me to sleep. The terror of the situation had traumatized me, because I had to confront the possibility that