“Yeah, God knows where he gotthatmoney,” Dawson muttered. He’d seen it filling back in his accounts. But it didn’t feel right to him, because in his mind, once a thief, always a thief. Anything Ackerman paid him back might be just as dirty as the money he’d taken from Dawson in the first place.
“Daws, you know why he took your money. It was supposed to be a loan, a stopgap measure, and he’d always intended to put it back.”
Yes, that was the official story. The story Ackerman had told Brynn, which was why she was still talking to her father.
But Dawson had never believed it.
“That’s bullshit,” Dawson said, temper rising in his throat. He paced in his room. Back and forth. He was done playing nice.Simon should know that by now. Should knowhimby now. “He never intended to put it back. He thought he could take it and cover it up and I’d never notice. And if Brynn and I hadn’t divorced, he’d never have gotten found out.”
“Maybe,” Simon said, not sounding convinced. “But regardless if what he said is true or not true, it doesn’t matter now.”
“It matters tome,” Dawson argued.
“Yes, that much is clear,” Simon huffed.
“I want to talk to the prosecutor about the plea.”
“Dawson,” Simon warned. “You know why that’s not a good idea.”
“I’m doing great here. You said it yourself. If I want to talk to them, why shouldn’t I?”
“You know why.” Simon didn’t need to say it.
Dawson swallowed his arguments. He didn’t want to fuck himself up again. Hedidn’t. But he also didn’t want Ackerman to spend the next few years lounging by his pool and enjoying his putting green, sleeping between thousand-thread-count sheets, and never, ever really paying for what he’d done.
“I’ll think about it,” Dawson said uselessly. Simon wasn’t wrong. That was the worst part of this. Maybe he should be prioritizing his own emotional well-being over some potentially misguided desire to punish his ex-father-in-law for his “temporary loan.”
“Good,” Simon said. “I’ll tell the prosecutor’s office you need a few more days, but I’m sure that when you’re back in Toronto, you’ll give the plea another look and it’ll look better, yeah?”
Dawson was not convinced of that, at all, but he would at least try. He owed himself that much, didn’t he? Simon had said it himself, he was fitting in great in Toronto. Rejuvenating his battered reputation. Whydidhe want to drag it all back out again? He should want to let it go.
“Okay,” Dawson said.
He hung up and flopped down on the bed. For a second he lay there and told himself the story Simon had tried to sell, once and then twice and now a third time.
He wanted to believe it was true. That this was the best he was going to get. But there was a feeling, tickling at the back of his throat, in the base of his stomach, that felt the same now as it had when he’d first begun to realize what Ackerman had done.
Like Simon wasn’t only onhisside. Not anymore.
But that would be crazy. That would be Dawson being paranoid again, sure that everyone was out to get him. And everyone wasn’t.
Itwasa white-collar crime. Simon had been telling him that from the beginning, but also from the very beginning he’d mentioned more than once how lucky all the victims were that Dawson was included in their ranks because he brought attention and publicity to a case that might not have gone anywhere otherwise.
But Simon’s narrative had changed. Now he was eager to get Dawson away from this as fast as possible.
That might be because Dawsonhadstruggled so hard last year. It might be a selfless action—Simon hoping that Dawson could redeem himself and resuscitate his career. Or it might be for another reason entirely.
His phone, on the bed next to him, vibrated, and he glanced over.
It was a text from Cam. It only read684.
His room number.
Cam hadn’t invited him, but the invite was there anyway, in between the lines.
After Cam had gone out of his way to mention that he didn’t have a roommate on this trip, he’d intended to head over to Cam’s room just before curfew hit, but now he was in kind of a shitty mood and wasn’t sure he should.
Of course, if he didn’t, he’d just sit and stew. Feel worse, instead of better. Because Cam was always like magic—mellowing Dawson’s grumpiness effortlessly, like he wasn’t even trying to do it, it justhappened.
