I whipped my head around. “And be inyourdebt? No thankyou.”
“You’d rather keep doing…?” He gestured to the back of his car, but I knew he meant being anescort.
“No. I’m going to look for a realjob.”
“Don’t you already haveone?”
Ifrowned.
“You’re working at the inn, aren’tyou?”
“They’re not payingme.”
“Whynot?”
“Because. I’m not doing it forme.”
“Who are you doing itfor?”
“For someoneelse.”
He wet his bottom lip that was thinner than his upper one, and it glinted in the darkness. “Do your aunt and uncle know about yourdebts?”
“They’re aware of some ofthem.”
“And they won’thelp?”
“I would never accept their help.” Jeb offered to loan me the money for the rental payments, but I’d refused. I’d let him foot the bill for the window he’d broken, though. “By the way, they don’t know about what I did tonight, so don’t you dare tellthem.”
“I won’t say anything about yourdate.” He spoke the word as though it tasted bad. After a long moment, he asked, “Would you have slept with him if he’d paid youextra?”
I wrinkled my nose. “I would never sleep with someone formoney.”
Even though I could barely make out his face in the dim light of his dashboard, I could tell he was weighing mywords.
“Why?” I asked. “Wouldyou?”
“Sleep with someone for their money?” He let out a soft snort. “Thankfully, I don’t need to resort tothat.”
“I meant, have you ever paid forsex?”
“No.”
“Yourdad—”
“I know what my dad did. But just becausehedid it doesn’t mean I do it.” He made a sound halfway between a growl and a sigh. “I’mnothinglikehim.”
“That’s what everyone says. That you’re not likehim.”
“But you don’t believeit?”
“I like to make up my ownmind.”
He finally angled the car back on the road. “Seems like you alreadydid.”
My pulse sprang like a livewire inside my veins and knocked against the side of my neck. I almost apologized, but he was a Kolane. He might not beallbad, but he was still the flesh and blood of the man who’d laughed at an eleven-year-old girl in need of guidance and who’d raped a bereft widow after she’d begged him forhelp.
Chapter Thirteen
