I nodded.
Trent had given me a month. I could wait it out to ensure Collin’s protection. Then fuck this place. I’d start a new life.
But what about Collin’s career? And what was happening on October twenty-seventh? Who sent Trent the watch?
God, I wanted to talk to Collin. I was keeping too many secrets from him, which meant he could be doing the same.
Logan brushed his lips across my forehead and stepped back. “Go to your meeting. I’ll wait while you think. Just don’t take too long.”
How would I stop him from murdering my family? He could do it right now and vanish. On the flip side, he couldn’t stop me from turning him in. Unless he killed me.
My nerves went rampant as I watched him leave. Our parting agreement balanced on some pretty delicate trust.
On his way out, he grabbed the trash bin that held the snake and tucked it under his arm. The muscles in his back and arms flexed as he moved through the room, stretching the wool jacket.
His hard body wasn’t built for a suit. All those strong, rugged edges belonged in black leather, straddling a bike. Was I imagining this? My belly fluttered at the notion.
At the door, he glanced at me over his shoulder and pointed at the snake inside the trash bin. “You do this yourself?”
Collin had helped me find the breeder and haul the snakes in, but the rest was all me. I smiled. “I know how to handle a snake.”
He returned my smile with a sad one and vanished around the corner.
21
Kaci
As the next two weeks passed by, a miserable knot took root in my stomach. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, and the day-to-day demands of my job took their toll on my concentration. My jaw locked in a permanent clench, nausea greeted me with each new hour, and the shriveling feeling in my chest made every breath a goddamn challenge.
Sitting in the suffocation of the boardroom, I leaned into my elbows on the table and swallowed the rush of saliva filling my mouth. It was all I could do to not heave the anxiety writhing in my stomach.
The source of my torment filled four high-backed chairs along one side of the table. My parents and my in-laws sat in their usual them-against-me positioning with the wood surface between us. Even with my eyes averted, I could feel them. Their filth in the air, the prick of their passing glances, the blather of their voices, all of it strumming my nerves into unbearable anger.
They droned on like they hadn’t committed ungodly crimes. Collin’s parents bickered about the profitability of launching a new cable network. My father piped in with his technical solutions. And my mother sat silently, casting her judgment with an over-plumped sneer.
Logan and I sat on the opposite side of the table with a chair between us. A chair full of contention and looming decisions. We hadn’t spoken about our secrets since the morning I delivered the snakes, yet we interacted daily as CEO and VP. He learned the ropes while I dealt with the politics surrounding his employment. Together we managed the operations as if it were our only preoccupation.
He hadn’t made any moves against Trenchant and instead seemed to be settling into his new role. But his patience was a ruse. The ticking tension between us hummed over my skin during staff meetings. When we crossed paths in the halls, his cursory glances pierced me with silent questions.
We restrained from lingering looks in the presence of others. To the unknowing eye, our interactions were professional. From my family’s perspective, we were enduring a forced partnership.
No one knew what I knew. Beneath Logan’s suave smile and crisp suit was a murderer with a premeditated intent to finish what he’d started. No doubt he spent his free time mining the company ranks for rats while I tortured myself in deliberation, taking too long to decide, delaying the inevitable.
The inevitable was why I couldn’t warm my icy fingers, why I’d lost five pounds, and why my body felt like it was shutting down. The inevitable put my family in prison or in the ground. But the part I struggled with the most was knowing once everything was brought to fruition, Logan would be gone. As a fugitive or behind bars, he wouldn’t be here with me.
What the hell was I going to do about it? My severe mistrust of every damned person in my life had built a barrier between me and Collin. I couldn’t come up with a convincing reason to tell him about the vile things our parents had done. What would stop him from turning them in? He didn’t give a shit about the impact that would have on Logan. Or worse, what if he defended them? What if he already knew?