“With what?” I hedge, plucking out a marshmallow.
He just looks at me.
And God, I don’t want to tell him.
I have to, though.
I have to end this shit.
“They came not long after I donated the money and moved into my own apartment. I was working at a vet clinic answeringthe phones but figured I’d go to tech school so I could eventually help with the animals.”
“You would be good at that.”
“Yeah,” I whisper.
“Then what happened?”
I fight back a shudder as I set my hot chocolate aside.
His eyes flick to it then back to mine.
“A woman approached me, said she had a great job opportunity. I didn’t trust her, obviously, and turned her down. Then someone else made an approach, and hereallydidn’t like it when I turned him down too. But I didn’t relent—I had a job, a place to live. I didn’t need a ‘great’ opportunity.”
His chest rises and falls on a breath, like he knows the worst is coming.
And it is.
“At first, it seemed like nothing—notes in my mailbox I just threw away. But then I started finding them in my apartment.”
He goes stiff.
“Not shoved under the door or anything, but”—this time I can’t hold back the shudder and it vibrates through me so violently I’m glad I put the mug of hot cocoa down—“on my kitchen counter, my nightstand, next to my toothbrush.” I pause. “In my underwear drawer.”
His expression darkens.
“I just threw them all away, knew it couldn’t be anything good.” I sigh. “And then I lost my job.”
He curses.
“I’d given the money away, so I didn’t have much of a safety net, and even though I applied everywhere, I couldn’t get a new position. So eventually…I was evicted.” I nibble at the corner of my mouth. “But it wasn’t until I was living out of my car that things got really bad.”
He sets his beer beside the mug. “How bad?”
I don’t want to think about that time. “What was on the flash drive?”
“My father’s personal journal and enough information to ruin my family.”
No hesitation in unleashing the bomb he just dropped.
“I…what?”
“How’d it get really bad?”
I blink once. Twice. “Ruin your family?”
“My father was a bastard—you knew that much.”
I nod.
