Chapter 33 Bree
Bree
Friday morning starts like any other. Take-out coffee because I’m still avoiding the break room.
Emails that need answering. Calendar that needs organizing.
The office gossip has died down, though I still get the occasional glare or knowing glance.
The usual glamorous life of an executive secretary who may or may not be sleeping with her boss.
Living the dream.
I answer on the second vibrate. “Hey, what’s up?”
“Bree.” Her voice is strange. Too breathless. “Oh my god. Have you seen the news?”
My stomach drops.
In my experience, nothing good ever follows that question. “What news?”
“Your thesis adviser. Kendrick. He was fired. There’s an article. Multiple women came forward, exposing a pattern of harassment, and the university actually investigated this time. They fired him. Finally got the bastard.”
The words don’t make sense at first. They’re just sounds, syllables crashing together in my ear like a language I used to speak but forgot.
“What?” I manage.
“Chronicle of Higher Education,” Sora says. “It’s everywhere. Bree, he’s done. Like, actually done.”
I mumble something about calling her back and hang up. My hands are shaking as I pull up the Chronicle website on my computer. The headline is right there, front page of the higher education section.
Prominent Professor Fired After Pattern of Harassment Uncovered.
I read the article.
Multiple women. A decade of complaints. Title IX investigation. Termination for cause.
Some victims are unnamed, but the descriptions of his behavior are so specific, so eerily familiar, that I can practically taste the cheap wine from his office.
The late nights. The special attention that turned sour. The way he isolated his targets.
Six women. Six other women.
I wasn’t alone this whole time.
I should feel relieved. Vindicated.
Instead, I feel sick.
Because I know exactly who did this.
“If you had a cat,” he’d asked, “and your cat stole food you’d spent all day cooking for someone else, would you forgive the cat?”
I thought it was just another one of his weird metaphors.
I didn’t realize it was a goddamn confession.
A cat. A stupid cat.
I’m on my feet before I consciously decide to move. Past my desk. Through the glass walls. Straight toward the corner office.
I don’t knock.
Nico looks up. His dark eyes meet mine and when he sees my expression he immediately says, “I’ll call you back,” and ends the call without waiting for a response.
He stands. All six feet one inch of him, towering over me, the scar along his jaw catching the morning light.
Normally I’d notice how attractive he is.
But right now, I just want to throw something at his head.
I close the door behind me. He fumbles with the smart glass panel, and finally turns the glass opaque.
“What did you do?” My voice comes out quiet.
“Bree.” He says my name like it’s a complete sentence. Like it explains everything.
“What the fuck did you do?” I press.
He has the decency to flinch, but he doesn’t look away. “I made sure he couldn’t hurt you. Or anybody else. Ever again.”
“I told you not to!” The words rip out of me, louder than I intended. “I told you this was my story. My choice!”
“And I couldn’t watch him get away with it,” he argues.
I’m shaking now. All fury and tears. “You promised me. You lied to me.”
“Yes,” he admits.
No excuses. No justifications. Just that single devastating syllable.
“You can’t just—” I stop. Start again. “You can’t use your money and your power to decide what happens with my life.”
His jaw tightens. “To expose a predator? To stop him from doing to someone else what he did to you?”
“That wasn’t your decision to make!” I yell.
He takes a step closer. The air between us crackles with tension. I can smell his cologne, woody and spicy, and I hate that my body still responds to him even when I’m this angry.
“You wanted to ignore him and move on.” His voice drops. “Fine. But I couldn’t.”
“So you hired investigators? You dug into my past without telling me? You. . .” I struggle to find words big enough for the betrayal.
“Dug into his past, not yours!” Nico argues. “The investigators were told to steer clear of you.” He steps closer still. “Look, this is about a man who destroyed your career because you said no. This—”
“I know what he did!” My voice cracks. “I lived it!”
His eyes bore into mine. “I hired people to find the truth. I didn’t blackmail anyone. Didn’t manipulate evidence. They found six other women. Six. And the university buried it every single time.”
Six women. The number from the article. “That’s not the point.”
“It’s exactly the point,” he replies. “This wasn’t just about you. He’s been doing this for over a decade. And now he can’t anymore.”
“Another powerful man deciding what’s best for me.” The words taste bitter in my mouth.
His expression breaks, and I see the pain and hurt my words caused.
Good.
“I know.” His voice is rough now. “I know I crossed a line. But Bree, I couldn’t.” He struggles, and I’ve never seen him struggle like this. He touches the scar along his jaw. An unconscious gesture.
“I’ve spent my entire life unable to go back and stop what happened to me,” he finishes. “But I could stop this one thing, for you, so I did.”
The confession hangs between us.
And god help me, I understand it. I really do.
The broken logic of it, the desperate need to protect someone from the pain you couldn’t protect yourself from.
But understanding doesn’t fix what he broke.
“You lied to me,” I say quietly. “You looked me in the eyes after I told you the most painful thing that’s ever happened to me, and you promised you wouldn’t do anything, and then you did it anyway.”
He forces a wan smile. “Yes.”
I study him. “Were you even planning on promoting me? Or was that just another lie?”
His brow furrows. “I was. Definitely planning on it. But I was trying to be respectful of the timing. Wanted to get this done, first.”
Respectful of the timing.
Like I’m an item on his calendar.
A deliverable to be scheduled between board meetings.
“I can’t do this.” The words feel like rocks in my throat. “I can’t be with someone who won’t trust me with my own life.”
I turn and walk out.
He doesn’t follow me.
I grab my coat from my desk, shove my phone in my pocket, and head for the elevator. Cressida says something as I pass but I don’t hear it. Piper smirks from reception and I don’t care.
The elevator doors close and I finally breathe.
The ride home is a blur. Subway to Astoria. Stairs to my walk-up. Keys in the lock, door slamming shut behind me, and then I’m alone in my tiny apartment with its affordable furniture and its dying plant and its walls that have never felt more cramped.
I’m just thankful that I never fully moved into his penthouse. Almost all my stuff is here. That makes this easier.
Makes what easier?
I don’t think I’m going to break up with him.
Or am I?
I should be furious.
I am furious.
He lied to me. He went behind my back. He used his money and influence to make decisions about my life. My past. My trauma.
But Kendrick is gone.
Actually gone.
Not just avoiding me. Not just at a different university. Gone. Fired. Disgraced.
And unable to hurt anyone else.
I didn’t have to be the one to destroy him.
I didn’t have to be brave or strong or go public or relive it all in depositions.
Someone else did it for me.
Letting someone else fight my battle.
Probably not great for my whole independent woman brand.
I sink onto my couch. It’s seen better days but still holds up.
The afternoon light filters through my sheer curtains.
I’m still angry at him.
I’m relieved about not having to face Kendrick.
But I’m still angry.
And underneath all of it, in the place I don’t want to look too closely at, there’s a question I can’t answer.
If someone fights your battles for you to protect you, is that love or control?
And does it matter if the person doing it has scars that match yours?
I don’t know.
I don’t know anything except that my chest hurts and my eyes are burning and somehow, impossibly, I miss him already.
Shit.