Chapter Twenty-Six
Sawyer
After being gone for a week and a half, it’s been strange to be back in my physiotherapy office.
Since I opened my business for low-income customers and pro bono work, I’ve never taken so much time off in a row.
But it’s hard to be sure if the strange sensation in the pit of my stomach has to do with catching up with clients and figuring out where I’m at with everyone, or if it’s about Dalton becoming more connected to the team.
If I’d known it was even possible for Dalton to become a factor in the Bellerive Bullets’ organization, I’m certain I wouldn’t have taken the job.
It’s bad enough that I have to see him at social functions and pretend like we ended things amicably, but having to sit in meetings with him might undo the progress I’ve made since I left him.
Of course, I can’t tell Logan any of that.
Keeping that truth from him also feels uncomfortable.
A part of me wants to confide in Logan about exactly the kind of man Dalton Worthington is, unload all that trauma.
The more time we spend together, the more I want Logan to know everything, every part of me.
Giving him my history might make things better for me, but I’m certain my truths would make things worse for Logan and the team.
“You good?” Bituin asks as she clicks through files on the computer. “No Logan today?”
“Rest day,” I say. He’s at my house waiting for me, and I check my watch again. Matilda and her son should be here any minute.
“Are you okay if I leave? I have a nail appointment.”
“Sure. Matilda isn’t usually late.” Normally, running behind wouldn’t bother me in the slightest, but after having the intense one-on-one time with Logan on the road, I just want more. “You can leave. I’ll give her another ten minutes and then assume something came up.”
“See you tomorrow,” Bituin says, logging off the computer and turning off the monitor.
I’m in the weight and workout room when I hear the front doorbell go. “In the gym,” I call as I check my watch again and see a message from Matilda. Before I can read it, someone clears their throat.
But when I glance up, ice shoots through my veins. “What are you doing here?”
“Since I’m now one of your bosses, I thought I’d stop by,” Dalton says. “Never thought you’d be working for me again, did you?”
“I never worked for you in the first place,” I say, swallowing.
He leans a shoulder against the only exit from the room unless I jump out a window. “That was quite a show your boy put on for the world this past week. You going to break his heart too?”
My thoughts get jumbled at the implication that I broke Dalton’s heart. It’s not true, but I don’t know how to clearly and concisely refute it—like my brain won’t work. The fight, flight, freeze mechanism is in full “deer in the headlights” mode.
“All those public displays were a bit juvenile, don’t you think?
A bit forced. A more mature man who has a better sense of what’s appropriate and when is more your speed.
Someone to help keep the Tucker name as one that’s worth something in this country.
I’m actually really concerned about you.
Such erratic behavior. You’ve been all over the place since we broke up. ”
I bite the inside of my cheek and give my head a little shake. “Why are you here?”
“I told you.”
I stare at him, waiting. Being alone with him is like watching the cobra rise, the hood flare, and trying to hold still enough to avoid the strike.
“I’ve been thinking lately,” he says.
I don’t encourage him. I just wait. The strike will come.
“You know, it would be a real shame if someone hacked into my accounts. I’ve set up a lot of security on my devices since we were together.
Now that I’m part of the government, that sort of thing matters—keeping private and public affairs locked down.
But there were so many people who had to help me set up that security that it’s hard to know who saw what. ”
“You wouldn’t…”
“I didn’t. I’d never. That’s what I’m telling you.”
“You let people view…” I can’t bring myself to say the words, to admit any of it out loud.
“Of course I didn’t let anyone. Honestly, Sawyer, do you really think I’d just let someone look at our private collection? I’m simply telling you that I lost control over who was able to see what during my security orientation.”
“Our collection? You took those videos and pictures without my consent.”
“We were in a loving, mature relationship, Sawyer. You consented.”
“Being in a relationship doesn’t equal consent.”
“You knew what I was doing, and you never said no.”
“That’s not true. You had cameras set up—”
“You’re overreacting. They’re security cameras, and they happened to be there when you couldn’t wait to get somewhere more private.”
He couldn’t wait. It was always him, and he knew exactly where his cameras were. “Some of those photos you took while I was sleeping.”
“Once you started working out with the adventure race group, you looked amazing. Sue me for being a proud boyfriend.”
I can’t win with him. No matter what I say, he twists it, like he always used to. Twist and turn my words until I’m the irrational one, the immature one, incapable of reason. “Why are you here?” I grind out the words.
“Now that we’re working together, I thought it was important that you knew I didn’t have complete control over my content. That’s all. Just a heads-up.”
“You’re threatening to release those videos and photos?”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” He places his palm over his heart, and he draws back like I’ve hit him. “That would hurt you and be deeply embarrassing. The way you couldn’t wait, couldn’t get enough in those videos, I mean…”
In one of those videos he rips my dress, and I laugh.
On the video I laugh, but I remember being uncomfortable.
So afraid that if I did or said something, he’d only get more aggressive.
That was always the hardest part with Dalton, the unpredictability whenever we were alone.
In public, he was a dream, but alone, he could be a nightmare.
“We both know I’d never hurt you on purpose. I would never do that. But I can’t control what other people might do.”
It’s just one lie after another. Knowingly releasing the videos and photos without my consent is illegal in Bellerive. But if he’s “lost control of his content,” he’s already setting the groundwork to spin this lie in court.
“It’s interesting. Logan Bishop doesn’t seem like the type who’d enjoy watching you being fucked by another man. Some men probably wouldn’t mind at all. Might even get off on it. The few times I’ve met him, he just doesn’t seem like the type.”
“What do you want?” I can hear the edge of tears in my voice, and I hate that he can probably hear it too.
“Nothing,” he says with a shrug. “Since we’re working together, I just wanted to make sure we both understood where we stand—who’s in charge. Get that out of the way.”
“When Alex comes back—”
“Queen Aurora isn’t due to give birth until after the season finishes.
King Alexander will be out for the rest of this season, without a doubt.
Your dad and I and the rest of the key partners will be the ones making decisions about salary caps and trades and all those other things.
I have a real vision for where the team should be headed, which the Advisory Council loved when I pitched it. ”
I’m not going to ask him where that vision has the team. Off the island is a distinct possibility, even with all the money the country poured into the arena and surrounding area in the first place.
“I’m just the physiotherapist,” I say.
“You’re much more than that, Sawyer. Or you could have been.” He still hasn’t left the doorway, but he straightens now. “But I wouldn’t want you to start thinking you’re more than hired help. You wouldn’t want to be too involved in the behind-the-scenes decisions with the Bellerive Bullets.”
The thing is, I actually don’t want anything to do with whatever happens behind closed doors.
I never have. But my father and Alex put me in those rooms, and there’s a part of me that wants to push back now.
If I cared more about the team than I do about Logan, I might.
As long as he leaves Logan out of whatever political maneuvering he’s trying to accomplish, he can cut me clean out of the team.
I swallow as I consider his words. All this time, I haven’t wanted to go there, antagonize him more, but Dalton doesn’t have all the cards, and we both know that too. Straightening, I look him in the eyes.
“Officer Foster came that night—the night we broke up.”
“The night you overreacted?”
“The night you shoved me so hard I fell and hit my head, knocking me unconscious. The night I found out you’d been tampering with my birth control. That night.”
He sighs, as though I’m a child he’s going to try to reason with. “Now why would I do any of that? Yes, you hit your head. But you tripped. The birth control stuff—I still don’t understand where you got that idea.”
The same anger I felt that night is bubbling up inside me. “Officer Foster has all the evidence. I can still press charges.” Stephen told me I had a year, and that’s far from up.
“It didn’t happen the way you remember it, so of course you wouldn’t file a formal complaint.”
He’s right that I didn’t file anything, but Officer Foster said he’d keep the evidence safe in case I changed my mind. “I can still file.”
“Can you? I think you’ll find that Officer Foster isn’t as available to the Tucker family as he used to be.
Poor timing for you, I suspect.” He checks his watch as though this conversation is of little consequence.
“I have a meeting. Enjoy finding out that your plot to ruin me never stood a chance.”
With that he strolls away from the door, and I hear the bell go, signaling his exit.
Immediately, I grab my keys and head for the door, locking it behind me. My brain is in a fog as I head to the central police station in Tucker’s Town.
At the front desk, I tap my fingers until one of the officers finally comes to speak to me.
“What can I do for you?”
“I need to speak to Officer Stephen Foster.”
“That’s gonna be tough. He left the force last week. Went off island. Don’t know much.” He turns and calls into the other officers in the station. “Anyone know where Foster went?”
There’s a mix of “no idea” and “off island” and “blew this joint” that come from various voices.
“Looks like the Tucker police train has hit a dead end,” he says. “Tell your mom that if she needs a new inside guy, one of us will do it for double whatever she was paying Stephen.”
I grit my teeth and push off the front desk.
Ava will know where Stephen is, and as soon as I’m out of the station, I dial her number.
“I’m having a really shitty week,” Ava answers with instead of hello, “so this better not be a call that’s going to piss me off.”
“I’m looking for Stephen.”
There’s a long silence on the other end of the phone.
“Hello? Ava? Officer Foster. I need him.”
“He’s gone,” she says, and her voice hitches. “He just fucking up and left, Sawyer. For no reason.”
“Left on vacation?”
“No,” she says, and her voice hitches again, an uncharacteristic show of emotion. “His apartment is empty. He’s gone-gone. I don’t know where he went.”
“What did you do, Ava?”
But she doesn’t answer me, she just hangs up.
My chest grows tighter, like something is ratcheting a vise around my lungs.
Before, our destruction was mutual. If I pressed charges, Dalton would find a way to leak every photo and video he’d taken with or without my knowledge.
And he must have known that if he released what he had, I’d come after him through Officer Foster.
But I don’t even know what to do now. I climb into my car, and my breath comes sharp and shallow.
Dalton’s going to hold my naivety over my head forever, and I’ve got no way to fight back. I don’t even know how to fight back.