Chapter 34 – Braelyn #2
My eyebrows shoot up to my hairline. Does everyone and their grandmother have a PI? “I’m sorry. What the fuck now? What’s with all this PI stuff and following me around?”
“I tried to fire her two weeks ago and she blackmailed me,” he explains, looking at Anne scathingly.
“She had these pictures of us.” He points to the ground.
“And said she’d publish them and accuse me of coercing her into sex.
I hired a PI to follow her around and earlier this week, he found the information on her husband and how he related to you.
He also discovered that she was having you and Roman followed.
I don’t give two shits about Roman, but I had my PI simply keep an eye on you.
I wasn’t doing it to cause harm but to keep you safe until I could find a way to get her taken care of. ”
I shake my head, more than a little burned out after the day I’ve had.
At the pictures still sitting at my feet that I can’t even comprehend yet.
“You’ll all deserve what you get. I have no regrets,” Anne states.
“Except I have evidence of everything you’ve done, including stalking with malicious intent.
I have the garage video of you following me out and pushing yourself onto me before you got on your knees, and I was shaking my head and saying no.
I have receipts you charged to the network for your Vegas trip, followed by your Mexico trip, the latter of which wasn’t solicited by us.
I have records of the payments you received from Intertainment and the emails you were stupid enough to send from your work computer telling your PI to, and I quote, ruthlessly follow Braelyn and Roman and to find anything he could that would hurt you. ”
I’m not breathing. Or I’m hyperventilating. Or both. All I know is I’m a half-beat from passing out. Holy shit. I can’t believe this. My trembling hand covers my lips as I absorb what’s happening before my eyes.
“Sorry to end your revenge scheme,” Adam continues.
“If you leave Braelyn alone, I won’t press charges, though you’re obviously fired.
If you go near her again, I’ll ruin you to within an inch of your life and make sure you go to jail.
Don’t test me on this. I have a longer list of your crimes than I stated. ”
Anne looks like she’s about to use her red talons and scratch Adam’s face off.
Instead, she kicks the photographs at me.
“It doesn’t matter. I already ruined her life again.
The pictures don’t lie.” She gives the cruelest smile in the history of the world and saunters down the hall to the back employee entrance.
One of the night nurses catches some of this, but I wave her away, letting her know everything is fine.
She looks at Adam and back at me but doesn’t press it.
She knows about what happened with him and with Roman and me, for that matter, as everyone in Boston does.
But she and I aren’t close and instead she turns and goes back to work.
“Are you okay?” Adam asks, his hand going to my shoulder.
“Am I okay?” I laugh. That’s actually a good one.
“No, I’m not okay. A woman plotted an entire revenge scheme for me and cornered me in my hospital, and you showed up because your PI, who’s been tailing me, tipped you off about it.
” And I’m looking at pictures of my husband kissing another woman.
So there’s that. “This isn’t exactly fucking Candy Land, Adam. ”
His expression softens, his eyes all over me. “Braelyn, I’m sorry. About all of this. She seduced me. It was never my idea, and I never went after her. You have to believe me.”
I scrub my hands up my face and blow out the harshest breath of my life. “Adam, I seriously don’t have the bandwidth for another one of these conversations.”
He holds his hands out, placating me. “Fine. I get it. But she’s out of your life now. I’ll make sure of it.”
“Thank you.” It’s all I’ve got. It feels like someone was tenderizing my insides with a hammer. It’s as gruesome and painful as it sounds.
“I’d do anything for you.” He grasps my chin until I’m forced to look at him. “I still love you. Despite everything, I love you and I want to be with you. I tried to stay away these last couple of weeks. I fired her and I tried to clean everything up. But I can’t get over you.”
My face pinches up. “Adam, please…”
He bends and picks up all the photographs, keeping the ones of him and Anne but forcing the ones of Roman with the woman into my hand.
“Roman’s a loser. He’s damaged goods. You’ll see. When you’re ready, I’ll be waiting and I’ll see you tonight at the fight.”
“Why are you going? You never go to his fights.”
“The bachelor party I’m attending wants to.”
That catches me strangely, but my head is too full to do much with it.
He kisses my cheek and leaves me standing here.
I fall back against the wall, trying to make sense of everything.
Corporate Barbie and all the things she did simply because she heard me say her husband was going to code.
Yet another instance of my intuition being a serious motherfucker.
Then Adam showing up and stepping in like that.
Now these.
The redhead has her arms around Roman’s neck and she’s pressing the side of her face against his chest. His arms are out as if he’s in the process of hugging her back, but her expression is one of pure contentment.
Of happiness and love. His isn’t much of anything, and in the next picture, his eyes are closed and his hands are on her shoulders as they kiss.
And he is kissing her. I can see that. Their lips are pressed together and he’s holding her tightly.
“Hey,” a voice comes from my side. Quinn. “I thought you’d be gone by now.”
I don’t respond. I’m still staring at the picture of my husband kissing another woman. I mean, I realize I never call him my husband unless I’m teasing him, but that’s technically what he is. Boyfriend sounds dumb in my head because it’s Roman, but he’s that too. Or was, I guess.
No. Roman isn’t this guy.
“Are you okay? You’re—what are those?”
“Pictures,” I manage, though my voice isn’t my own.
“I see that. Is that…”
“Yes. That’s Roman kissing another woman.”
Quinn takes the photos from my hand, but instead of lighting them on fire for me like a good friend would, she’s holding them up and inspecting them.
“Are these new?”
“He was wearing that shirt this morning. That’s all I know.” I drop into a squat and blow out a breath because legit, my vision is hazy and I don’t want to pass out in my ER. I have to think and I can’t think that well right now because my brain is all fucked up.
“Braelyn, what the fuck?”
I cover my face with my hands and breathe through my fingers because I don’t have a paper bag handy.
“It was the woman I caught with Adam.”
“In these pictures? I thought she was blonde.”
“Not the woman in the pictures. The woman who gave me the pictures.” I launch into an account of what just happened, and by the time I’m done, Quinn’s hand is locked on my shoulder in a ninja grip.
“Braelyn, Jesus. I’ve had some patients and their families do crazy shit, but that’s up there. Are you okay? From her, I mean.”
“I have no clue what I am from her. Adam says he’s taking care of it, but I’ll have to double that up and likely file a report or something. I don’t know. I’m not a Fritz. Not really. Forest will help me with this.”
“I realize you’ve recently been cheated on, but Roman wouldn’t cheat.”
“I never thought Adam would cheat either. Seriously. If someone had asked me if he was cheating, I would have replied never in a million years.”
“Babe, think about this for a moment. We’re talking about Roman Fritz.
The man who tattooed an infinity symbol on his ring finger for you.
A man who married you and didn’t even blink twice about it when he doesn’t even date.
He’s forever fighting for you, planning your future, and reworking his entire European situation around you. It’s Roman.”
I sigh and stand. “I know. I do. My head knows this. But my heart is so tired. It’s been through so much, and it doesn’t know what to believe.
You’re literally holding a picture of a woman kissing him.
His eyes are closed. His hands are on her.
It doesn’t make sense to me, but visual evidence is telling me something else.
Or honestly, I’m too messed up after everything that happened with Katy and then this for me to figure it out. ”
“Go to his fight, bring the pictures, and talk to him.”
I nod because that’s all I can do. I have to believe there’s an explanation for this. Even if right now it doesn’t feel like that’s possible.