“I didn’t—” I started again. “Alex, I didn’t tell anyone about Emma.”
Except Will. Shit. Except Will.
Alex let out a harsh breath. “That’s not even the worst part.”
Ice slid into my veins. “What do you mean?”
“Hinds called me.”
Kate stopped pacing and I stopped breathing, both of us intently focused on my phone. “He’s furious, Nate. He thinks we lied and that the whole thing was staged to make him believe you would stay in the marriage, but that you’re going to divorce her just as soon as he’s out of the picture.”
“I’m not going to do that.”
“I know, but optics matter, and right now, he doesn’t believe that we operated in good faith,” he said, then followed it up with the words I’d been dreading most. “We’re still in the probationary period. Legally, he can pull out. No penalties. That’s what he says he’s going to do. Kate is his goddaughter, Nate. Can you blame him?”
“No.”Fuck. “No.”
Kate turned back to me, her eyes wide.
Alex cursed over the line. “Seriously, Nate. What the fuck have you done?”
CHAPTER 44
KATE
Ididn’t realize I was shaking until after Alex had hung up. The apartment felt too small all of a sudden. Too bright. It made everything we’d just been told feel too real.
Nate stood at the counter, staring at the phone like it might start talking to him. Like maybe Alex would call back and sayjust kidding, it’s nothing. Go back to your perfect little lake weekend.
I wrapped my arms around myself again, feeling like I might fall apart if I didn’t physically hold myself together. “Tell me this isn’t happening.”
“It’s not happening yet,” he said immediately. “It’s gossip. Speculation. We’ll talk to Abram?—”
“That’s not what I meant.”
He looked up at me then, and I saw the same sick feeling that was clawing at my gut reflected back in his eyes.
“They know about Emma,” I said slowly. “They. Know. About. Emma.”
He ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
I laughed, but it came out brittle and humorless. “Well,someonedoes.”
He flinched slightly, like he’d heard the accusation underneath the words. “I didn’t tell anyone, Kate.”
I cocked my head at him. “Nate.”
“I didn’t,” he insisted. “Not like that.”
Not like that.The words scraped down my spine as I stumbled back a step. “Then how? Because I didn’t tell anyone at all. Not a single soul, alive or dead. Do you know how hard it was to keep that secret? And you made an exception?”
He hesitated for just a second, but that was enough. My extremities went numb, my heart launching into my throat. “Who did you tell, Nate?”
He exhaled hard and rubbed a palm across his face, dragging it down slowly before he looked at me again. “Will. I told Will. That’s it.”
