Rich (Benson Security #5) - Janet Elizabeth Henderson Page 0,50
talk to. If you want her number, I’d be overjoyed to pass it on. Goodness knows you could use some counseling.”
To his credit, Ryan huffed out a laugh. “Great. I’m glad you’re coping, but I still don’t want any part of the bet. I don’t care what everybody else does, but I’m withdrawing from it and butting out of your sex life. Sleep with Harvard, don’t sleep with him; it’s up to you.”
“Did you hear that?” Harvard said as he placed the plate in front of Rachel. “We have Ryan’s permission to sleep together. It’s just what we were waiting for. You want to skip dinner and head downstairs?”
“How can you joke about this?” Ryan asked.
Harvard held the man’s gaze. “Because I’m not going to tell Rachel how she should deal with an assault that happened to her, not to me. I’m going to trust her when she tells me she’s fine.”
“I’m not ashamed of what happened to me, Ryan,” Rachel said. “The reason I hesitated in sharing those photos is I’m a private person. It’s not like I’ve been ignoring this for years. Believe me, Harry and I tried to find out who raped me, but there was no trail. The room was rented under an assumed name, check in was done remotely, and no one remembers who collected the keycard. If there had been an online trail, Harry would have found it.”
Ryan looked pained. “Why didn’t you let the police investigate? There might have been forensic evidence that led to those shitheads.”
“Yes,” she agreed as she sipped her wine. “I’ll admit, I regret refusing the investigation at the time.”
“What the hell?” Elle snapped at him. “Are you saying this is Rachel’s fault that these guys weren’t caught?”
“No!” Ryan clasped the back of his neck with both hands and let out a frustrated sigh. “I just hate the thought of these bastards getting away with this. I hate that Rachel went through it. I hate that somebody’s using it against her right now. I hate feeling…”
“Helpless?” Rachel raised her glass to him. “Welcome to my world. I hate it too. Which is why I refuse to feel that way. One day, I’ll find out who they are, and I will eviscerate them. Then they’ll discover that I’m not the same girl they toyed with years ago. Until then, I have to do what’s best for Benson Security and for my father’s company, which means doing my job. Elle can take the photos and see if she can find any clues in them, but until we have something concrete to go on, we’re better off focusing on finding TayFor’s thief.”
“So, we’re just going to ignore this?” Ryan said.
“No,” Rachel said. “We’re going to do what I’ve been doing for the past ten years. We’re going to live our lives.”
Harvard took his seat beside her, resisting the urge to wrap his arm around her while she ate. He had the good sense to realize that the boundaries he could push in private weren’t ones she’d tolerate being pushed in public. “We’ll expand our investigation to include finding out who sent the photos. We know they have a vested interest in TayFor, and we know this situation with Rachel is personal for them. What we don’t know is whether the person who’s blackmailing her was involved in the attack, or if they came across the photos some other way.”
“Do we bring the rest of Benson Security in on this?” Elle tugged her laptop closer.
“That’s up to Rachel,” Harvard said.
As all eyes turned to her, she dabbed her lips with a napkin. “The warning gave me three days to leave TayFor. Let’s hold off telling everyone else for now. Until we have something more to go on.”
Ryan’s jaw clenched tight, and it was easy to guess he wanted to rush the building with every man he could find, interrogating every staff member until he found the culprit.
Looking Rachel in the eye, Elle cleared her throat and said, “You are amazing, and we’ll investigate your attack any way you choose. Whatever your plan, I have your back.”
For a second, it looked like Rachel didn’t quite know what to do about Elle’s declaration, but then she caught Harvard’s eye and said, “Is there any more pasta?”
“Yeah.” He stroked a hand down her back. “I’ll get you some.”
Chapter Fourteen
Elle took the photos away to have them tested for prints and DNA and to see if she could get anything off them digitally. Ryan lingered to talk