“We have to.” She blew out a breath. “Because I’m not letting her harm you, too.”
The line went quiet again—not heavy this time but shared.
I turned onto the road where the houses clung to the hills and the ocean flashed between rooftops. For the first time all day, the silence didn’t feel like an enemy.
CHAPTER THIRTY
LUKE
Ipulled into the drive and noted there was nothing out of place, as if life was perfect. The house wore its museum face—lights staged, fountain running. You’d never know I’d spent the afternoon dragging Mila out of Elise’s firing line or that practice had felt like skating with sand under my blades.
I killed the engine and sat there long enough to watch the kitchen window go dark then flare back to life. A shadow crossed the glass, profile sharp for half a second. Not staff.
Inside, the air carried the low hum of circulation. I dropped my gear by the mudroom bench and followed the low glow down the hall. The study door stood open a few inches. Dad’s voice came through, not raised. Worse. Smooth, controlled, a temperature drop.
“Come in here, Luke.”
I pushed the door and stepped onto the rug, preferring to stand. He didn’t look up right away. When he did, fury banked behind his eyes as he turned the monitor so I could see it. My checking account. A debit line highlighted in the middle of the page:Marcus Vega Investigations. My hands curled into fists.
“Would you care to explain why you’ve hired a private investigator?”
I wasn’t silent because I was shocked. I was counting to three to breathe around the anger. I made it to two.
His hand came down on the desk—not a slam, just a placement with weight. “Don’t insult me. You think I can’t see where the money goes?”
“It’s my checking account.” My shoulders pulled tight. “You had no right to be inside it.”
His eyes flicked up, pale and precise. “The account might carry your name, but don’t mistake it for independence. I can lock it with one call. If you want to test me, go ahead.”
“I don’t need protection from the truth.” I stepped closer.
His gaze cut through me, and he set his tumbler of whiskey down too hard. The glass rang against the wood, a loud note in the quiet room. “Then tell me. Why the investigator? What exactly are you digging for?”
“I’m trying to figure out what’s going on. About Darren Langley. About what Dunn started and what we may have finished. About what Elise did to Avery. About what she’s trying to do to Mila.”
The explosion came fast, hotter for being contained too long. “Stay the fuck out of it, Luke.” He growled. “You hear me? Out. That mess isn’t yours to touch.”
“What mess exactly?” I forced the words through my teeth.
His hand flattened against the desk, hard enough that the lamp rattled. “All of it. That Mila girl is nothing but trouble. I warned you. Drew warned you. Stay away from her before she drags you under with the rest of them. You don’t need to figure out anything,” he ordered. “You need to focus on your future. The company that will one day carry you if you don’t set it on fire first. That future is not with that girl.”
Cold slid through me, clean and surgical. “That’s not your decision to make.”
“You’re risking everything we built—our name, our company—over a girl and your obsession with things you don’t understand.”
“Maybe I’m risking everything to stop being blind.” My hands curled against my thighs. “Dunn deposits hit Darren’s account before he vanished. His house sold. The proceeds landed clean. No withdrawals. No trace. And now—today—Dunn’s daughter tried to take Mila down in front of the entire school. You think that doesn’t touch me? Don’t preach risk to me.”
His chest lifted, held, lowered. “She’s a problem, Luke. Her mother was inside our walls once, too close to things she had no right to touch. Now you’re walking the same path.”
“Maybe it isn’t about them.”
Dad’s head tilted.
“Maybe it’s about what you’re hiding.” I didn’t raise my voice. “About what Lorne did. About what you authorized or refused to stop.”
The silence that followed grew teeth. The house hummed around it—the discrete whir of ducts, the soft buzz of recessed lights. His gaze pressed like weight, daring me to flinch.
“You’re young,” he said finally, a verdict he’d been waiting to deliver. “You think loving a girl makes you immortal. It makes you vulnerable. It makes you stupid.”
