Wyatt’s eye roll was lost behind his sunglasses. “Of course not. I just don’t want to look like one of your leather handbags when I’m thirty. My skin care routine takes a solid hour and I’m not going to ruin it by scorching myself with this brutal noonday sun.”
“Your ridic—” She shut her mouth abruptly, lurching forward and snatching his chin, jerking his head upward. “What the hell is that? Are those… Wyatt Edgeworth, is that a handprint around your throat?”
The blood rushing to Wyatt’s face felt worse than any sunburn could. He stared at his own horrified expression in the mirrored lenses of Charlie’s aviators before he cut his gaze to Linc, praying he couldn’t hear Charlie’s high-pitched shrieking. “Shh, keep your voice down.”
Charlie gasped, lurching to her feet. “Keep my voice down? Did he do this to you? Did he hurt you?”
Before Wyatt could say a word, she was off like a shot, charging toward Linc as fast as her espadrilles would allow. “What the fuck is your problem, dickface?”
Linc’s brows ran for his forehead in confusion, though he looked disconcertingly unflustered. “Uh, I’m a little busy here,” he said, giving his phone a jiggle in case she had somehow missed it.
Charlie plucked the phone from Linc’s fingers and tossed it into the pool. “Now you’re not,” she shouted. She shoved Linc with both hands, but he stood firm, staring down at her like she was a rather annoying insect ruining his picnic. That did nothing to dissuade her. “Do you think that because you’re bigger than he is and stronger and… older that you can just bully him? That you can abuse him and hurt him? Do you have any idea what he’s been through? Why don’t you pick on somebody your own size? You’re disgusting!”
Linc blinked down at Charlie stupidly as Wyatt tried to pull her back. “Charlie, it’s not like that at all. Please, shut up, before you make it even worse.”
As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he regretted them. Both Linc and Charlie stared at him, mouths agape, which Wyatt might have found hilarious in any other situation, but which was not at all funny now. Charlie balled her fists at her sides and turned on Linc, whose eyes went wide at the horrific screech she emitted just before she punched him in the face.
“Ow,” Linc muttered, putting a hand over his now injured eye.
Jesus. What the hell was happening right now? “Charlie, stop! What is wrong with you? Let’s go talk in my room, okay?”
Before she could answer, the front door once again opened and closed and all three of them turned toward it. Wyatt’s stomach dropped, and he did his best not to vomit. Of course, his father chose today to show up.
Wyatt prayed the entire building would suddenly collapse and take them all out in one spectacular mess. But alas, the building held firm. Money couldn’t buy happiness, but it could buy top-of-the-line construction materials.
Charlie’s blue eyes went feral at the sight of his father, and Linc and Wyatt could only watch in horror as she marched toward the older man and poked her clawlike nail into his navy blazer. “This is all your fault. Are you just so desperate to control him that you’ll let this savage kill him? Look at him! Look at his throat. You just won’t be happy until he’s dead, will you? Do better! Be better!”
She didn’t wait for an answer, just made one last terrifying girl noise before flouncing out the door, slamming it in her wake.
“That girl is as bug-shit crazy as that heathen mother of hers. I don’t know what Craig was thinking marrying that woman.”
When neither he nor Linc responded, his father’s gaze darted between the two of them. After a moment, he strode forward, snatching Wyatt’s jaw hard enough he feared he’d incur more finger-shaped bruises. An uneasy feeling settled in the pit of his stomach as his old man turned to scrutinize Linc once more. There was nothing Wyatt could say to get Linc out of this. If he told his father how it really happened, Linc was out of a job and if he didn’t, Linc was still out of a job.
“Wyatt, go to your room. I think I need to have a talk with your new security detail.”
“Dad—” Wyatt started.
His father turned on him, spitting his words between clenched teeth. “What’d I say?”
Wyatt flinched back reflexively, and his father sneered at him with unbridled disgust. Wyatt’s gaze dragged over his father’s shoulder to Linc’s.
“Go,” Linc mouthed.
Wyatt’s heart sank, but he did as he was told, fleeing to his room, slamming the door closed behind him and sliding down it, clutching his head in his hands. He ruined everything he touched. Now he’d ruined Linc too.
By the time Wyatt’s door closed, Linc was prepared to accept any consequence Montgomery Edgeworth doled out. He’d hurt Wyatt. Not on purpose, but the results were the same. Linc had put those bruises on the boy’s neck, no matter how much he’d wanted them there, and now he’d created an even larger problem between Wyatt and his father.
Linc never should have left the Marines. After just a few months, it was clear he had absolutely no clue how to function in the outside world. Jackson had handed him a job making six figures, and he’d managed to blow it up in a week. A job babysitting a kid on house arrest. That had to be some kind of record. He should’ve just gone back overseas as a hired gun. They made good money and didn’t have to pretend they still belonged in polite society. He should just start packing, but he would let the senator say his piece for Jackson’s sake.
“Lincoln, I understand more than anybody how frustrating that boy can be. He’s mouthy, he’s lazy, he cares more about his hair than he does about getting a degree and contributing positively to society. He never makes the right choice. He’s my greatest disappointment.”
Blood rushed in Linc’s ears, his pulse skyrocketing. Seriously? The man was blaming Wyatt for the bruises on his own neck. That was some next-level rationalizing, even for a politician. Linc shoved his hands in his pockets to keep from giving the senator a matching set of bruises.
“There have been a million times in my life where I’ve wanted to throttle the boy, but I don’t. You know why? Because I can’t afford child abuse allegations. Nowadays, nobody understands the benefit of discipline, of corporal punishment. It’s all participation trophies and entitlement. Do you understand what I’m saying?”
“No,” Linc answered honestly.
“I’m sure by now you’ve realized that my son has certain… proclivities.”
