“What are you talking about? Why are you lying?” Tears threatened and she fought to keep them at bay. Her entire body shook with reaction.
Did Bain believe this bullshit? Surely not.
Maybe he thinks I lied to him the way his ex-wife did.
Caleb leaned a hand on her shoulder, and she waited for Bain to say something. He was incredibly possessive. But his gaze remained on Larry.
“Show them, Arianna,” Larry urged.
“There’s nothing to show.” This was all so preposterous.
“Then you won’t mind proving it,” Larry said smoothly. He opened her laptop. The screen came up, asking for her password.
“You don’t have to,” Caleb murmured to her. “Let me get rid of them.”
It was tempting. So tempting.
But she couldn’t help but feel like Bain might always doubt her if she didn’t prove that she was telling the truth.
“I have nothing to hide. Here.” She walked over, unlocked her computer and opened up her documents. She froze. What the fuck was that? Under recent documents there was a new file. Labelled Letters.
Larry came around and put his hand on the small of her back. She thrust his hand away. “Don’t touch me.”
Bain stepped up, forcing Larry to take a few steps back. Relief flooded her at the move. Maybe she was imagining things. Maybe he had drawn back because he’d gone into bodyguard mode.
“Easy, man. I wasn’t going to hurt her. I care deeply about Arianna.”
“Sure, you do,” Caleb mocked.
“Well, what is that file, Arianna?” Larry pointed at the one labelled Letters. Now she wished she’d never opened her laptop. She didn’t know what the file was, had never seen it before but she knew what she was going to find in it.
“I never put that file there,” she said hastily, looking over at Bain. “It’s not mine.”
He gave her a slight nod. Did that mean he believed her?
“Arianna, please, we know it’s not your fault, darling. Just let us help you.” Her mother walked up next to her and opened the folder. Inside there were three documents. She knew what was going to be on them before her mother even clicked on them.
No. No, no, no.
Her breath sawed in and out of her lungs. Nausea bubbled in her stomach and if it wasn’t for Caleb wrapping his big arm around her waist, she thought she might have lost her balance.
“I didn’t write those.”
“They’re on your laptop, darling,” her mother pointed out. “How else would they have gotten there?”
“Someone planted them.”
“And who would do that? How would they do that?” her mother asked.
She had no idea. She just knew that somehow, someone had. She glanced over at Bain, desperate for some sign he believed her. He frowned at the letters, going through each one. Then he turned to look at Dominic. They held some sort of silent communication.
“So who delivered them?” Bain asked. “Because that sure wasn’t Arianna.”
“She told me she paid someone to deliver them,” Larry said. “And that she gave him a card to gain access to this level.”
She felt so hurt at their betrayal she couldn’t even speak.
“You need to leave now,” Dominic stated firmly.