Jordan fought not to react. He had no right to. And yet, his hands twitched at his side.
“After ten months of living together, he went away on a shoot without me. We were apart for three weeks, the longest we’d ever been. I—” She made a soft choking sound.
Jordan wanted to crush her against him and tell her she didn’t have to keep talking if she didn’t want to, but somehow, he knew she did.
“I missed him, and he said he missed me. So, I made a video for him. Ugh,” she groaned, rubbing the heels of her hands against her eyes. “I hate thinking about it. I made that video in less than five minutes, and it’s ruined my fucking life.”
Anger burned in Jordan’s chest.
She took a deep breath and looked at him. “I made a nude video for my boyfriend, and I trusted he’d keep it for him only, but of course he didn’t. He shared it with his friends, and they shared it with theirs. And within a week, anyone who was on the internet had seen it.”
Words backlogged in his throat. His fists clenched and unclenched beside him. “Vanessa, that’s?—”
“Awful?” She huffed a laugh, but it didn’t carry humor. “Yeah, it’s pretty much haunted me ever since. Kurt got his tech people to take down as much of it as they could. At first I adored him. He was older, and he took care of me. I thought he was my savior. I let him flirt with me, eventhough I knew he was married.” Her tears hadn’t fallen, but Jordan could hear them in her voice.
“We never crossed any real lines, or so I told myself. He made me feel special. But that whole time he was getting inside my head. Making me think I owed him, that he owned me. It was a big power play. I ignored the red flags. He’d kept copies of the video and used them to control me.”
He should’ve fucking killed Robertson in the hallway.
“Things got bad. By the time Joel came to Vancouver, I had lost myself. He ensured all of Kurt’s copies were destroyed, and I came here.” She shrugged casually, like this story wasn’t heart-shattering. “I assumed everyone and their dog had seen that video, but I guess his wife hadn’t. Or maybe she thought I’d filmed a new one. Whatever the case, someone sent it to her and had it look like I’d created it for Kurt. She kicked him out. That’s why he was here. He thought I sent her the video to get him back.”
The only words circling in his head were all fucking bad. What fucking world did they live in that a private video created by a nineteen-year-old was made public and then never went away? Not even after six fucking years?
“Vanessa, I’m so sorry that happened to you. I wish—” What did he wish? That he’d known her when she was nineteen? That she’d been his girlfriend instead of Noah’s, because he would never have fucking treated her like that? He would’ve put her on a pedestal and worshipped at her feet.
Or maybe he wouldn’t have. Six years ago he’d been in prison, a different man completely.
Her gaze met his, silently asking him to finish the sentence. “I wish you were always treated like you deserve.”
Her expression softened. “Thank you for saying that. And for helping me, in the kitchen and…in the hallway.”
He nodded, then silence stretched between them. He should leave and give her privacy. He’d already decided he’d be sleeping on her couch, and if she fought him on that, he’d sleep on the floor in the hallway, but he wasn’t leaving her tonight. The way he was feeling, he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to leave her again.
He turned to leave, intending to run across the hall to get Nigel.
“Did you?—”
He froze a step away from the doorway. The words filled the quiet room. He knew what she was worried about.
“Is he?—”
Dead. The word hung silently in the air. That’s what she thought his monster heart was capable of. She wasn’t fucking wrong, because he regretted now that he hadn’t ended the asshole when he had the chance.
Slowly, he turned back toward her.
“Robertson’s at the police station. Gabe wants him charged with breaking and entering on top of everything else. He smashed the doorknob on the door from the bar to the apartments when he came up to this floor. He said he’d been watching you in the bar and saw you leave through the back, so he followed when no one was watching.”
“But you hit him.” She swallowed, the delicate column of her throat working its way up and down. “Many times. And hard.”
“I did.” He might have done much worse if Dex hadn’t arrived when he did.
“Didhepress charges?” She was talking to her hands, occasionally peeking up from beneath her lashes to glance at him. “He would. He would do that, you know. He could send you back to jail.”
A low rumble filled his chest. “Let the fucker try.”
She surprised him by sitting up ramrod straight, a fresh wave of panic darkening her expression. “No, I’m serious, Jordan. You can’t go back there. I know what it did to you. If he has it out for you, he’ll stop at nothing. He has money and power, and—” She shook her head forcefully. “I’m not worth it. You can’t go back there. I won’t let you.”
When had things changed between them so that she would move heaven and earth to keep him out of prison? And he would willingly walk right back in if it meant protecting her?
