“Ms. Erickson?”
I looked up to see a kindly looking gentleman. “I am Jose Luis. I work for Senor Sanchez.”
I couldn’t make heads or tails out of what he was saying. All I heard was Noel telling me he didn’t want our baby.
“Mr. Erickson hired him to protect you while you’re here in Mexico.” He pulled out his wallet and showed me credentials indicating he worked for a security company. “Are you okay?”
“I…I…” Could I trust this man? In the span of a few minutes, my world had toppled. So had my confidence in my ability to judge people.
He pulled out his phone and made a phone call. A few moments later, my own phone rang.
“Harper. What’s going on?” Bran’s voice brought some comfort.
“Where are you? Are you almost here?”
“I’m in the plane. I’ll be there in an hour. Mr. Sanchez’s man says you’re not well.”
“I don’t know what to do.” I couldn’t get my head straight.
“Go with his man. He’ll take you back to the hotel. Archer and his men will be there before me. Let them know you’re back when you get there, okay?”
“Okay.”
“I’ve never heard you like this. What happened?”
I looked up at Jose Luis and nodded. He smiled and led me to his car.
“Noel…he…”
“Honey? What’s going on with you and Noel?”
It had been a long time since I’d heard my brother’s voice be so concerned and nurturing, especially around something that normally would have made him react with anger.
I sat in the back of the car, too tired to carefully choose my words. “I love him.”
He was quiet for a moment. “Does he love you?”
“No. He told me to leave. He said I was a good fuck but too difficult.”
Bran growled. “When?”
What did that matter? “Just now. I saw him in jail and his ex was there telling him how they’d set him up. He told her he’d fuck her all night if she let him go. Then he told me to leave. That he didn’t want our baby.”
“Baby?”
I closed my eyes realizing I hadn’t told Bran. I waited for Bran to lose his shit.
“Is it possible he just said that to make you leave.”
“He absolutely said it to make me leave. He told me to go several times.” I leaned my head against the window, too tired to hold it up.
“What I mean is, maybe he didn’t mean it. You just said that woman set him up to be arrested. She’s part of the cartel, right? If I were Noel, I’d do whatever it took to get you away from those people. I’d also not want them to know I cared about you. They have more reason to fuck with you if they knew it would hurt Noel.”
I sat with that for a moment. “You think so.”
“I don’t know, to be honest. But I find it hard that you’d fall in love with someone who could be so cruel.”
He had a point, and yet, sometimes Noel was cruel. Then again, it always seemed to happen when he thought I was betraying him. Other times, he was sweet.