There was a quiet ease to him that hadn’t been there before.
We walked for a while without talking, and the silence was comfortable in a way that still surprised me. I’d spent twenty years dealing with Jimmy’s mercurial moods.
Bronson’s silences felt like a rest in comparison to that.
I tripped over a small hole in the sand, and his grip tightened automatically, steadying me without a word, and I thought about how that was exactly what he did.
He made me feel steady and grounded in his presence. I could almost forget that someone was trying to kill me.
“I heard you and Cal talking last night. Do you really think it’s Jimmy?”
He scanned the beach in one direction, then the other, before starting our walk back to the beach house.
“I don’t think it’s Valerie,” he rumbled softly as he stroked my cheek, “or Jenna Love. That leaves one name.”
“I keep thinking about Jimmy,” I said quietly.
Bronson didn’t interrupt. He just stayed beside me, steady and waiting.
“The men he used to bring around,” I went on slowly. “His business associates. There were always these guys who felt like they had a dark edge to them. I never knew what they did. They weren’t the security detail, and they weren’t other music producers. Whenever I walked into a room with them, they’d change the conversation.” I swallowed. “I always assumed it was industry stuff. Contracts. Deals. I didn’t question it because… I trusted him.”
“What kind of men?” Bronson asked.
“Um… Older. Expensive. Sometimes they gave me old money mafia vibes.” I frowned slightly, trying to pull the memory into focus. “They came around a lot, even when we were touring. Jimmy always met them in private with the door closed and a security guard stationed in front of it.”
“Do you remember any of their names?”
I shook my head. “No. I didn’t pay attention.”
Bronson’s jaw shifted slightly. “I’ll pass it to Cal.”
Maybe it was nothing. Or maybe he was right, and Jimmy was behind these attacks.
“The timing lines up,” Bronson said, his voice matter-of-fact. “The attempts started after the divorce filing. He’s stalling the process. And if something happens to you before it’s finalized…” He didn’t finish the sentence.
He didn’t need to.
My stomach tightened.
“He inherits everything,” I said quietly.
“Yeah.”
That knowledge sat there, real and heavy between us.
I tightened my grip on his hand without thinking.
“I’ve known him for half my life,” I said. “I built everything with him. I trusted him completely.”
Bronson grunted. “Sure. But that doesn’t mean he’s a good man.”
“Even though he’s been cheating on me for years, I didn’t think he was capable of something like this.”
“This isn’t about love,” Bronson said quietly. “It’s about money.”
The words landed hard.
And suddenly I feared it was all true.
