I kiss her then. Soft but fierce. A promise sealed against her lips. She melts into me, her fingers gripping my shirt, and for just a second, nothing else exists.
When I pull back, I press one more kiss to her forehead.
“I’ll be watching every second. The moment anything goes wrong, I’m there.”
She nods, her eyes clear now. Determined.
I force myself to let go of her hand and slip into the shadows.
From my position behind a concrete pillar, I watch Claire square her shoulders. Watch her transform from the trembling woman I just held into someone who looks ready to face down a monster.
That’s my girl.
She gives me a small nod across the darkness.
“Yeah,” she says quietly. “I’ve got this.”
9
Claire
There’s a black limo driving up the ramp toward me. When it stops, I can feel my heartbeat in my throat as nausea grips me tighter and tighter.
Alec said he wants me. To actually date me. And now I’m about to do this? Yeah, my head is going to explode.
I have one goal for this meeting, and I know exactly what it is. I need to get McDowell, the man who assaulted me, to say something incriminating—that he did this to me, that he threatened me.
Hell, I need him to threaten me now on camera so Tess can film it.
I can’t believe she saw me at the station. It’s still such a wild coincidence that she was there, but now that I know she was researching Theodore and everything he’s been up to, it makes sense.
I really hope this is how we’re going to get the senator thrown behind bars where he belongs.
He shouldn’t be making money off taxpayer dollars. He shouldn’t be assaulting people. And he needs to go to jail.
The driver’s side door opens, and a man almost as big as Alec steps out. He’s wearing a dark suit with sunglasses on, and he walks toward the back of the car, opening the furthest door on the passenger side.
My breath catches.
Theodore McDowell steps out of the limo like he owns the entire world. And maybe he thinks he does. His movements are slow, deliberate. Controlled. He buttons his suit jacket with one hand, then straightens his cuffs.
He doesn’t look at me right away.
That’s somehow worse.
When he finally does turn his head, his eyes find mine across the parking garage, and everything in me goes cold. There’s no warmth there. No humanity. Just calculation. Like he’s already decided exactly what he’s going to do to me tonight.
Like I’m prey, and he’s been waiting for this.
He smiles. That too-white, too-perfect smile that makes my skin crawl.
“Well, well, well.” His voice echoes off the concrete walls as he approaches, his fancy shoes clicking with each step. The sound is unhurried. Patient. “Look who’s come crawling back to me.”
I swallow down everything else I’m feeling right now aside from determination, because what I need to do is make this guy think I’m sorry.
I need to make Theodore believe that I want him, that I’m remorseful and still… attracted to him.
You can do this. Get him talking. Get him on tape.
